Search Posts
Haven't been on the boards for a bit, but my locals mentioned this to me. Looks awesome! Hoping to still see the harrow guy in the future of course, but I assume this version is going to have more going on from level to level. Also, for obvious reasons, excited to see you mention the haunt interaction. Haunts are super cool, and having a way to interact with them aside from just killing them makes me stoked. They often have really neat back stories that don't come out, so players are just "that was weird, oh well let's move on" Honestly, most heartened by your willingness to listen to the playtest feedback. I know I can be a but heavy handed in my criticism, but I hope you felt it was helpful in some way, and not too much of a bummer
so
Many of the spells in this chapter originated with the faithful of a particular deity and are more common among the worshipers of that god. Such spells are denoted with the god's name in parentheses after the spell's name. Worshipers of the spell's associated deity always treat the spell as common, and need not research the spell in order to prepare or learn it. Despite this, all the spells in this chapter are available to members of other faiths, though some temples or religious organizations may proscribe the use of specific spells. Additionally, arcane spellcasters have unlocked the secrets of casting particular spells. what does that mean for arcane worshipers of a deity in pfs? currently in pfs worship of deities is required for certain traits and feats, as well as certain alternate spellcasting. this statement from inner sea gods implies to me that all worshipers of gods get the spell regardless of whether it is on their spell lists or not. if it doesn't mean that i am rather confused why these lines were printed.
this seems great at 3, which was pretty much a dead level already. i like that it gives you a reason not only to have high charisma, but makes learning charisma spirits that much better. i still think you should be able to trance more often, but this definitely gives people something to do, without being too wild.
Those are both not using your fortuitous aid ability, but instead using swift aid and bodyguard (it's why later abilities say things like "when using fortuitous aid" rather than "when using aid another"). I'll make sure to clarify in the final. If you clarify fortuitous aid is not the same as aid another, remember to change the wording for the seance boon so it stil works.
Condolences sir.
so had the opportunity to run another low level mod, this time i went with the spirit whose secondary power seemed pretty rad to me, the cricket. i like going fast, and for emerald spire tower ruins, ignoring difficult terrain ended up being pretty important. well, not really for me but whatever. Sven Mofanaah:
Sven
DEFENSE AC 17, touch 16, flat-footed 12 (+1 armor, +5 Dex, +1 spirit)
OFFENSE Speed 45 ft.
STATISTICS Str 7, Dex 20, Con 10, Int 12, Wis 13, Cha 12
after playing at 4, i wanted to see how much a difference level 1 is. turns out, not much. i didn't have spells that i wouldn't have cast, and i had one less trance per day. my ac was one lower. i had a crossbow and did crossbow damage. as for the mod, as soon as combat started i tranced to get the higher level power. moving 45 feet and shooting gave me a +7 attack and a d8+4 damage, which was pretty neat. and then i realized i had to reload, so i couldn't shoot again. i could just run up and punch people for a +0 attack and d4+2 damage, and i ended up doing that a couple times. most of my actions were spent running around opening doors and telling my team where the baddies were. honestly tho, this build prolly isn't very representative of what people will do. sure it would have been nice to be able to do something other than shoot or open doors but i could've chosen other spirits to do that. which begs the question: why are there spirits that do almost nothing at low levels? is the balance set so that there are spirits that are better low and get worse high and vice versa? because if so it seems that will be confusing for a lot of people, not knowing what spirits to learn and which ones to get feats that synergize with. there have been hints of one that gives exotic weapon proficiency at high levels. what is the point of that? exotics is something you want before you buy your first magic weapon, so like level 3 or 4 (to keep it out of splashing range). theorycrafting with the cricket, if i go medium 1, occultist (transmutation)1, inquisitor (travel) 1, occultist (flame) 1, barbarian 1, and one feat spent on fleet i can activate all my speed things to get to 110 speed before buffs. with expeditious retreat on i get to 140 at level 5, which is pretty sweet. trancing cricket, i can charge 280 feet, and get +16 attack and +28 damage for the charge, not including other things. of course that requires a thing to be 280 feet away in a straight line. i would get a sweet +44 to acrobatics for jumping at that speed, and could reliably jump over large sized obstacles in my path. so yeah, playtest experience summary: i'm pretty jazzed there is a rogue class that doesn't have sneak attack or spells. seriously, this is a class for roleplayers, and im happy its being worked on.
also after trancing the lost, it gained a lot of excitement for possible combos with azata's whimsy. people were just as confused as me why the spirit bonus is added to rolls in a straight one to one ratio. it feels like 5% per point of bonus makes more sense. the 2% bonus i had never actually made a difference, and feels like more a nuisance to keep track of than anything
i won! about to post a second playtest soon, lets see how i do. as for cyclone: whirlwind says it is treated as a dex spirit but doesn't give a duration. i would assume this is for the round? this is the first spirit that has its full alignment spoiled. is there any way we could find out the alignments for the current ones, so we can know if they are going to still be compatible when they are fully released? (i assume they are all on the neutral axis, and should keep their compatibility but i just wanna know.)
this class seems like a trip to rp. it gives you plenty of hooks, and some flavorful abilities that work with them. i don't really wanna get spoily about the scenario, so ill just give nitty gritty. it might still spoil the fights, so if you dont wanna know them, please dont read em. team was me as a 4th level medium, a level 2 psychic, 2 level 1 occultists, a level one geokineticist, and the arcanist pregen.
fight one, we know baddies are around, so i sent a wisp around a corner to draw them closer so arcanist can color spray. the baddies attack the wisp and miss it twice during surprise round. my first turn, i spend trancing to get the lost, as we know there are quite a few guys here and there is a possibility that confusion might be relevant. i didnt trance pre-combat, because we had no idea when the fight would start. baddies go, one attacks the wisp and dies, the others come around the corner, one fails it save against color spray, one is dazed by team. damage is dealt by team. next round i move up to be in the thick of things and summon another wisp, becoming confused at the end of turn. baddies see i am confused, saw what the wisp did, and just ignore me. some more drop, next turn i am still confused and end up babbling. i can see it is getting me nowhere so i end it at the end of turn. more baddies drop, and on my next turn i finish one off with my crossbow. in 4 rounds of combat, did 12 damage and used one of my dailies. the gm said the animals attacked the wisp because they could smell us, and their masters told them to attack nearest creatures. next fight, they start buy popping out and critting the earthbender. my wisp is right next to him, but there is no reason to attack it. everyone fights, i shoot off crossbow bolts for rounds 1 and 2, and on round 3 when the last one is standing next to 2 of our downed party members i antagonize it away. (before the session i changed tien and orc to ignan and terran, the sheet posted doesn't list that). the last guy gets killed before it goes again, i prolly coulda just shot it but i wanted to play it safe. in 3 rounds of combat, did ~8 damage, using no class abilities. next fight, obviously a boss monster, i spend my first round trancing lantern to get the miss chance. get attacked 4 times and it never triggers, end up paralyzed and just being a meat shield. in 4 rounds of combat, used one daily. the ac boost from dex spirit made one attack a miss. last fight, out of abilities, only have spells left which do nothing. shoot crossbows. baddie casts sound burst which pops a wisp and does 8 damage to him and knocking him out. in 3 rounds of combat did 13 damage, 8 of which is from a source the developer has said shouldn't be applying. i don't know why you wouldn't want the wisp to trigger from aoes, as that is currently the only reasonable way for them to be attacked. in all my games, i have never seen a creature or player attack a dancing light. as that is a cantrip, it can be safe to assume any intelligent creature would have seen it at some point in their lives and assume it is a harmless thing. questions brought up: what is the creature that is made with wisp? it says a tiny creature, but no stats are given, such as type, move speed, saves, senses. overall, class plays pretty much how i thought it would. as a 4th level player with a table of 1s and a 2, i felt about equal to them in strength. from what i can tell there is currently no advantage to taking more than one level of this class. the fights would've been the same if i were a level 1 medium/ level 3 warrior. well actually, i mightve not been paralyzed with a better fort save. why does lantern give sleight of hand? it isnt a class skill and cant be used untrained? honestly most of the seance boons seem trivial and tacked on.
the prollem with using cha as other stats is that it lets you dump the other stat with no drawback. even at cha -2 you would be getting an effective +21 points to your point buy. ( race with +2 cha, and dumping str, normally str gets you +4 points, and an 18 str would cost you 17 points).
That's one of the reasons why we don't have a finalized Spirit Specialization in this playtest. I would say SS: Strength works for the Rabbit Prince when it counts as a Strength spirit, but I'm undecided as to whether it would boost your AC and Ref saves too (clearly it would at least boost to-hit and damage and any Rabbit Prince specific abilities). lantern gives you sleight of hand, which isn't a class skill and is not usable untrained. your seance boon then gives everyone a bonus to a skill that cant be used untrained, which is weird. as for the wisp, i think the idea is that dumb creatures will attack it as it provokes attacks from them? it is a power that kind of forces the gm to play dumb with, allowing you to use your class abilities to something. if the wisp did something else, like give a penalty to ac for lighting someone up, or acting as faerie fire in its square i could see it being usable. a lot of the abilities are pretty useless at low level, and get cooler as you get into the higher tiers. i assume this is to discourage multiclassing, but as is it seems to shoehorn players into playing strength spirits at low level just to be useful.
so i'm building a level 4 medium for pfs tomorrow, and this is how it is currently looking (seanced demon's lantern): Justice Certainly
DEFENSE AC 22, touch 16, flat-footed 19 (+6 armor, +3 Dex, +1 size, +2 spirit)
OFFENSE Speed 15 ft.
Medium Spells Known (CL 4th; concentration +10) 1st (3)—dancing lantern, faerie fire (DC 17) Spell-Like Abilities (CL 4th; concentration +10)
STATISTICS Str 5, Dex 16, Con 16, Int 7, Wis 7, Cha 23
the designer has mentioned he has played with str spirits and that they seem good, i am curious how the class will play if i focus on one of the other stats. the lantern's wisp ability is the only power that really seems neat to me right now, but i'll see how it plays. while seanced like this, i can trance for higher wisp, for crickets speed boost and terrain ignoring, for lost's ability to make confusion slightly better, or for rakshasa's longer intimidate.
So for determining my spell list do I use my known spirits, my primary spirit, all my séance spirits, or my séance spirits PLUS tranced spirits?Reposting, 'Cuz its getting buried, and someone's gotta know. your spells known change each day, and are determined by primary, secondary, tertiary, and quaternary. trance does not provide access to spells known. this means at level 4 you have ~2 spells known per day, and ~4 at level 5. you go up to ~8 at level 7, and it keeps growing at a steady rate as you level up, to ~16 at level 17
i have to assume the unicorn's aid another bonus doesn't work with the benevolent armor quality and the helpful halfling trait, but does it interact with things that do not alter the bonus, and instead give you other things, such as gloves of arcane striking? is there a compelling reason to not have the aid another bonuses stack? if your only ability is that you help your teammates hit more and be hit less, why cap that at such a small amount? as an aside, as a person who has built aid another builds, i love this ability.
So right now the classes are legal, and I know you don't care about learning from multiclassing, but what happens if I play a multiclass with a level of this and don't earn the boon. Does the character become unplayable at the end of the month? I get you can multiclass after earning it safely, I'm just wondering what happens if I do it wrong? Are the classes not legal to take if you already have other class levels? Because if so it should say that somewhere.
I don't think the Medium should become the "swiss army knife" there's already multiple classes out there that already do that and better presently. Could do trance like rage and make it free action, and for a drawback you gain influence per round. That'd require influence to be something more like 1-10 or something tho, with seance capping at 5. Or even lose the influence, and make it so you are controlled by the spirit for double the rounds you tranced. This would remove the influence tracking people complain about, as well as make the spirit influence come up more often.
I'm not trying to game the system, I want a level of medium on my savage technologist. Who is already level 3. Obviously the boon can't be used on him, but the playtest classes are currently legal and will no longer be at the end of November. The boon says it can only be in a single classed character, and above it says it is ok to multiclass after. I'm asking what happens after the playtest window ends and I have that level on my barb. It seems the current only way to get a splash on a character higher than one is to retrain to an occult class, play a game to get the boon, and then retrain back.
For people that think there's too many options:
The reason I suggest this is because it is very unlikely you will be seancing different spirits each day. If this plays at all like the binder from 3.5, you will quickly find one you like and take feats and buy equipment that complement the abilities it gives you. @mark it looks like I'll be able to playtest one of these at level 4 on Sunday. Any particular spirit/build you wanna see play tested?
If I have a level 4 gm baby that hasn't been played, can it be one of these? If I take a level of one of these on a level 3 character, after the playtest ends can I no longer play the character? Are there retraining synergies? Could I retrain to one of these classes, play a level to get the boon, and then retrain the rest back and keep the splash level?
i see a few people asking for less spirits, please don't remove options from this class. i doubt you would, but figure i should say something. you had mentioned one of the non printed spirits gives weapon proficiencies in exotics, is that a level one ability? could you clarify that if you seance the same spirit every day, and even trance it once a day, you are in no danger of going to 4 influence?
If you have the Lg str spirit seanced, you can trance (or secondary, tertiary, etc) the lg spirits of other stats, as well as the ng and ln str spirit. That's it right? So 7 spirits for the corner alignments, 8 for ng, cn, ln, and ne, and 9 spirits for n. People complaining about the class having too many options at high levels are prolly not taking this into account. Unless I'm misunderstanding something. If this is how it works, it is gonna be pretty hard to know how the class works with only 1/3 of its abilities.
if this class had full bab and martial weapon proficiency yeah, it would be on par with a fighter. as it is, however, the lack of those makes them on par with warrior or adept
full bab and more proficiencies doesn't help the lack of real options (in combat and otherwise) from level 1-6 out of the options available we have : full round: trance (standard action at 6th) standard action: very limited spells starting at 4 (some might be longer or shorter, but this is the usual action), create wisp (demon's lantern), dancing lights (demon's lantern) move action: move wisp (demon's lantern) swift action: become confused (the lost), increase dc of a charm or compulsion and possibly lose your character if it works (rakshasa) immediate action: change attack rolls to 50% for you or adjacent enemies (rabbit) so at 6th level we have two standard actions to choose from that are different from what an expert can do. we have 4 spirits that give us additional choices, but 2 of those are choices that are not reasonable at all (confused as a swift action? why?). the closest class to this core is fighter, who gets feats every other level and full bab and other various boosts. this is what i mean about the class lacking choices of what it can do. sure, it has a lot of small boosts to various skills, but since you only have one or two boosts per day and it takes you an hour to change them, your boosts are unlikely to come up unless they are combat. and the combat boosts are just a flat damage boost and a choice between claws + enlarge and fists + flanking bonus.
i was trying to point out that the options are not as deep as you would think. its pretty simple, choose one of the full powers from the ones i posted. at level one you can always choose to either get the third part of a different power or the trance power of your current spirit for one minute per day. you get additional uses of this 1/day power as you level up, but not many more. at 5th level you choose either the first part or the third part of another power (with limitations for some reason) that yo know, to have for the whole day. none of the powers are really any better than rogue talents. so at first level (the best level) you get a grab bag of rogue talents that you can change each day, and then you dont get anything new until 4th level, when you get the equivalent of the major magic rogue talent. at 7th you get full access to the second level of your powers, which you have had access to since level 1, and you can access the 3rd level of your powers by using your 3/day power. from 7th you dont gain anything new until 13th, which is where the class functionally stops, as you now have access to everything useful you will get. so levels 1, 7 and 13 are great, and by that i mean they are like levels 3 and 5 for a wizard. none of the high level powers seem on par with what a 13th level rogue/druid/cleric/bard can do.
so i realized i was prolly doing it wrong posting all that stuff in the other thread, so ill make a private thread you guys can peruse at yer leisure. if all the other posts i made are moved here i don't mind. so talking with people, it seems a lot are confused by the medium. it seems like you have a ton of options, all up front, and it can be quite overwhelming. i have some time, so ill go over the options here. at level one you can seance spirits, and once a day trance as a full round action to get a second or boost the one you have. spirits, by stat: str:
dex:
con:
int:
wis:
cha:
it seems like a lot right? well mebbe it is, so choose a number of these equal to your charisma mod, and that is how many different ones you know. easier now right? so like 1-4 known. lets max it out, choose 4 you like. now choose one of those you want to use. every day you can choose a different one. its like you are a cleric who can switch between four domains but no spells per day. each even level you get to know a new spirit. now do that for 3 entire levels, nothing new being added. at level 4 things get exciting, you can cast a spell per day! actually since we have 18 charisma we can do 2 spells per day. granted, you only know 2 spells, and they are tied to spirits, and level one spells, but you can cast them 2 times per day. i meant to say it is exciting because you can now trance rakshasa and lose your character in exchange for casting command on an npc and letting the dm decide what the command does (exciting!). also at level 4 all those +1 to random things is now +2. at level 5 things get more real, you get to choose a second power from your pool of spirits. look at the third powers from the spirits, you now at level 5 get to choose a second one to have all day. so at fifth level we have 2 abilities, and 2 spells per day. so yeah, still not anything actually new being added. at level 6 the trance power is now a standard action and we can use it more. effectively another dead level, as no new options are available. at level 7, the trance powers become base powers, and some new trance powers become available. i don't really wanna describe them all, because whether they are good or not does not make up for levels 1-6. from levels 1-6 you are doing the exact same nothing every day. sure, you get to know more spirits, but they do not gain powers until 7. taking a level in this class is great, but each level after that is worth less and less until level 7. if wizards learned second level spells at level 7, they would still have more options per day than this class.
wisp: i love this one the most. such a cool ability. of course, after an opponent pops yer wisp, no one else will so you are done for the combat, but whatever. the wisp shield is good as long as you forget that moving the wisp is a move action so you aren't likely to have it in your square. the chance to damage attackers is cute, and would come up against anyone that saw you as a threat. again, levels 1-6 this spirit gives you pretty much no options in combat.
the waxworks first and second powers don't do anything for the first five levels. i guess if you are fighting with two weapons (claws from bear! (oh wait that doesn't work cause you cant trance two different things at once))) against a base 20 speed creature and someone else casts haste on you you can glue them in place on the third attack. and that is your option for the day. at 8th level with two weapon fighting feats you can start to glue people in place if you hit with all attacks. this would require a specific build that doesn't do much at all for levels 1-7 of course, but whatever.
hidden truth: this ability is the same as a rogue talent. so if i seance this, my ability all day is i am a level 2 rogue with no sneak attack. the trend for these abilities is that they are not as good as full class, i assume because the thinking is that you can change them every day. for levels 1-6, this is terrible, as each day i can change what underpowered class i choose to be. i think there has to be a medium between being bad at everything all the time and being good at everything all the time. mebbe being actually good at some things some of the time? and being able to change what things you are good at?
Yeah, it's 4th Liar with tranced Rakshasa that can leverage Exploit Dominion to really mess with people you've charmed. At 7th, going the other direction, All Are Slaves to the Rakshasa + Seductive Lies is also pretty nice. I'll leave you guys to find more of the other combos with these 18 spirits. There's even more with all 54!It is intended that your main benefit will be the longer Intimidate at first (quite handy if you are good at bullying people around). It's also a good spirit to call in with trance while you've got another mindbender like the Liar up and running. did you just say its pretty nice to be a 7th level character who can 2 times a day cast lesser geas at +4 dc and on the second time the lose control of their character? why not be a sorcerer/wizard and use extra feats/ school bonuses to cast it at +3 dc and not lose control of your character, and as an sorcerer/wizard actually do other things?
all are slaves to the rakshasa: while seanced to rakshasa with influence two, if i trance and use this ability and it fails i lose control of my character. this seems like a pretty steep penalty for failing to have my command spell work. i.e. i've already used my swift action, my once per day ability, and one of my few spells per day."If that target fails its saving throw, the Rakshasa gains 1 influence over you." You actually only lose control over your body if your spell succeeds (the enemy fails their save). So at that point, that dominate person or greater command had better be worth it! Especially with the dominate, you're now both slaves to the Rakshasa. After all, All Are Slaves to the Rakshasa, so it's all going exactly according to plan (for the twisted and manipulative Rakshasa, that is) so this ability isn't actually good until level 10? and by good i mean not good, because you are effectively killing your character to "maybe" kill an enemy? if i lose control of myself, and i dominate someone, doesn't the gm still control both characters?
It is intended that your main benefit will be the longer Intimidate at first (quite handy if you are good at bullying people around). It's also a good spirit to call in with trance while you've got another mindbender like the Liar up and running. at level 3 if i trance this while running liar i get a +1 to intimidate and can make intimidate last longer. and that is all for me for the day. after this i only have simple weapon proficiency and 3/4 bab. sure, tomorrow i can have claws all day, but today, i did one skill check and now im done. is there something else i can be doing all day? using liar to be cute to people? so some more charisma checks that i get +1 on?
exploit dominion: what is the intent of the penalty to attacks and saves for people who are affected by your compulsions? most of the spells from the rakshasa last one round. if i seance this at first level the only part of the power that does anything is the longer duration of intimidate if i trance with rakshasa at first level i get an ability i can't actually use unless i am multiclass. is this intentional?
all are slaves to the rakshasa: while seanced to rakshasa with influence two, if i trance and use this ability and it fails i lose control of my character. this seems like a pretty steep penalty for failing to have my command spell work. i.e. i've already used my swift action, my once per day ability, and one of my few spells per day. |
