Hiruma Kai's page

Verbal components don't add the auditory or sonic traits to a spell. They add the concentrate trait. So a magic missile cast from 20 feet away would work fine.

A verbal component is a vocalization of words of power. You must speak them in a strong voice, so it’s hard to conceal that you’re Casting a Spell. The spell gains the concentrate trait. You must be able to speak to provide this component.

I'd argue you can't speak within the area of silence, so spells with a verbal component can't be cast within the 10' radius area of silence, but unless the spell has the auditory or sonic descriptor, its effects can reach into the silence area without a problem.

So this thread has certainly gotten me thinking how I'd build a Scoundrel rogue, and the following is what I've come up with, at 6th level, just to make it easier for RoscoeDaLib to compare:

Goblin Rogue Creature 6
Snow Goblin Scoundrel Rogue level 6
Perception +10, Darkvision
Languages: Common (Taldane), Goblin

Skills: Stealth (expert) +14, Deception (expert) +14, Diplomacy (expert) +14, Intimidate (expert) +14, Medicine (expert) +10, Thievery +12, Arcana +8, Acrobatics +12, Athletics +11, Performance +12, Society +8, Survival +8, Nature +8, Games Lore +8

Str 16 (+3), Dex18 (+4), Con 12 (+1), Int 10 (+0), Wis 10 (+0), Cha 19 (+4)

Items: +1 Leather Armor (5th level item), Handwraps of Might Blows (+1 Striking) (4th level item), +1 striking composite shortbow(4th level item), Thieves' tools (Infiltrator) (3rd level item),Wayfinder (2nd level item), Bandolier (healer's tools inside) (0.1 gp), Healer's Tools (Expanded) (50gp), 60 arrows (0.6 gp), Adventurer's Pack (0.7 gp), 28.6 gp

AC 24; Fort +9, Ref +14, Will +10
HP 66

Speed: 25 feet
Melee: +1 striking fist +15, damage 2d4+3 (bludgeoning), agile, finesse, non-lethal
OR +1 striking claw +15, damage 2d4+3 (slashing) + 1d6+1 (fire), finesse
Ranged: +1 striking composite shortbow +15, damage 2d6+1 (piercing), deadly d10, propulsive
Note:Sneak attack +2d6

Arcane Spells DC 22, attack +12;
Spell slots: 2 Cantrips, 1st: 1, 2nd: 1
Cantrips (3rd): Electric Arc, Ray of Frost
1st level Spells: True Strike
2nd level Spells: Illusionary Object (2nd) (Signature Spell)

Focus Points: 1
Focus Spells (3rd): Dragon Claws

Ancestry Feats and Abilities: Cold Resistance 3, Burn It!, Very Sneaky
Class Feats: Trap Finder, Sorcerer Dedication (Draconic: Red), Basic Bloodline (Dragon Claws), Basic Spellcasting
Class Abilities: Sneak Attack 2d6, Surprise Attack, Scoundrel Racket, Deny Advantage, Weapon Tricks
General Feats: Toughness
Skill Feats: Lie to Me (background), Assurance (Medicine), Battle Medicine (heals 2d8+10), Continual Recovery, Confabulator, Glad-hand, Intimidating Prowess

One interesting thing I've realized that if an enemy rushes up to the rogue to nullify ranged attacks/casting, it can pull a very effective, feint + dragon claw + dragon claw solo. The dragon claw damage roll averages slightly more damage damage than a straight Thief rogue (at the cost of an extra action at the beginning of the fight and lack of agile).
2d4+3+1d6+1 = 12.5
If Burn It! doesn't apply to Dragon claw (I think it should but I could imagine some argument over it), its still 11.5 average. I'd probably swap out Burn It! for something else in that case.

For comparison, a 6th level thief likely rolls 2d6+4=11 average in melee, but has access to agile finesse weapons.

The other advantage is the character can trivially switch between melee, ranged, and cantrip actions without issue, as well as provide battle medicine with free hands if necessary (depending on your GM's ruling of that debate). Assurance + Expert medicine at 6th level is an automatic DC 20, so you get the 2d8+10 hit points back for 1 action.

True strike is an interesting option on an opening strike as there's good odds of getting a critical. I could see maybe taking magical trickster at 8th, to provide the option of deception or hide + ray of frost sneak attack out to 120 feet. Or maybe not. Even without it, the choices provide the build with a variety of damage and energy types (slashing, bludgeoning non-lethal, piercing, electric, fire, cold) that it can switch to without any equipment juggling. Plus illusions. And buy some scrolls to taste with the left over 28 gp.

The thing is here, by initially playing Scoundrel, he was playing the character that didn't need as much teamwork as the Thief. The Scoundrel is like the Jedi who doesn't need support.

If everyone goes off and fights their own monster, a Scoundrel is stronger than a Thief solo prior to 14th level and Instant opening. The thief with flanking buddies simply gets more benefit than the scoundrel.

The scoundrel wasn't doing bad damage, it just wasn't getting to use all the abilities it had available to it.

Its also a bit magnified by the stats of the character in question. 10 strength, 18 dexterity and 18 charisma at level 1.

If we compare a stat distribution which is better for the scoundrel build in terms of damage output, and compare it to a thief build also using the normal ABCD stat selection process you might get the following analysis for fighting solo.

Consider a 6th level goblin Scoundrel with 16 Str/18 Dex/12 Con/10 Int/10 Wis/19 Cha against a Str 10/19 Dex/14 Con/12 Int/12 Wis/18 Cha goblin Thief.

At 6th level, +15 to hit, and 2d6+2d6+3 for the scoundrel, and 2d6+2d6+4 for the thief using +1 striking shortsword (finesse, agile) Expert Deception on both is +14. Level 6 enemy, moderate percetion DC 24, moderate AC 23.

We'll assume the attack routine of feint, strike, strike, for 2 turns. If they're benefiting from feint until end of next turn already, it becomes strike, strike, strike.

So feint has 50% success chance, 5% critical chance. Except on the 2nd turn, if the scoundrel succeeded on the first, then its 50% success, 15% critical. The scoundrel's applies to all attacks until the end of the next turn, while the Thief's only applies to one, unless they critical feint.

Thief:
So no feint success, implies (0.8+0.5)*11=14.3 expected damage
Feint success implies 1.0*18 + 0.5*11 = 23.5
Critical feint success implies (1.0+0.6)*18 = 28.8
If the crit is 1st turn, that lets turn 2 be 3 strikes, with the 3rd strike adding 0.4*18=7.2

20.25% of the time, no feint success, 45% of the time 1 success, 25% of the time 2 successes, 5% crit success on first, and 2.25% chance of no success + crit success on second, and 2.5% chance of 1 success and crit success on 2nd.

Total expected damage solo over 2 turns for a thief is ~35.47.

Scoundrel:
No feint success implies (0.8+0.5)*10=13
Feint success implies (1.0+0.6)*17=27.2
3 strikes on 2nd turn implies 0.4*17=6.8.

20.25% of the time, 55% of the time 1st feint succeeds, 24.75% of the time 1st fails and 2nd succeeds.

Total expected damage solo over 2 turns for the scoundrel is ~48.87 damage. Or roughly 37% more damage solo. For a non-goblin build, strength would likely be 12 starting, 14 at 6th, dropping damage by 1 per attack, to an expected 45.65 (still about 29% more damage).

Compare to a straight 2-handed fighter at 6th. +17 to hit, 2d12+4 damage. (1.0+0.55+0.3)*17 over 2 turns is 62.9 expected damage.

With teamwork, and free flanking, the a 14 strength Scoundrel at 6th level still does 64 damage over 2 turns. The thief just happens to do more at around 72, roughly 12% more.

The overall damage output of both is fine, with the Scoundrel significantly outdoing the Thief solo, and the Thief slightly outdoing the Scoundrel with teamwork.

It just so happens the Thief is effectively getting flat-footed for free via teamwork regularly, rather than needing to feint in this particular group.

Graystone, out of curiosity, in your interpretation can I use the Strike action to attack into an empty square where there is no creature?

I prefer something like Pathfinder Agent Dedication, Eclectic Skill, Clever Improviser, Halfling Ingenuity or Untrained Improvisation that affects all untrained skills so you can access ALL lores vs training in a select few. This is especially true when you roll for extremely narrow lores that allow for the lowest possible DC possibly getting a better chance with a more generic trained lore.

I'm actually quite fond of the Elven options of Ancestral Longevity, Ageless Patience, Expert Longevity, and Universal Longevity. Its great for out of combat research or when you're on a trip to a pathfinder mission, you can swap in an appropriate lore and have some significant bonuses to an easier roll. Not as flexible on the fly, and generally not as good for in combat monster lore, but still flexible on a daily basis and has more bonus in that particular lore. I have a fighter with wizard multiclass dedication who'll eventually grab the line of feats. Level+4 expert +2 time + Int on a DC 5 easier check is going to be pretty good odds at mid-to-high levels (and no automatic critical fail on a 1).

So, for the record two people (SuperBidi and DeadManWalking) have said I simply don't understand the complexity of the system. When I requested a build to demonstrate - I am given something that at face value seems incoherent because it does not need to be a rogue. Unless, someone is going to make the point that a sorcerer doesn't have more value baked into the class by level 6 to outmatch an extra skill and 2d6 on a single bow attack per combat. This character could just be a sorcerer.

So just to clarify, I thought we were talking about comparing rackets, not classes? I'll point out at level 6, a scoundrel rogue has a bit more than a single extra skill advantage over a sorcerer. The scoundrel only has a single extra skill advantage over other rogue rackets.

A sorcerer at 6th, has 2 expert skills, and 3+INT trained skills plus a lore, and 3 skill feats. A scoundrel rogue at 6th has 5 expert skills, and 6+INT trained skills plus a lore, and 7 skill feats.

Out of combat, the rogue is going to be rolling more types of rolls, and generally better at them. While some of the low level skill feats are a bit lack luster, others are quite solid. Also, it depends a lot on the campaign on how often they might apply. I've seen a teenager playing a Leshy bard with Harmlessly cute (i.e. Shameless request feat gotten at level 1) basically pester the pathfinder society non-stop for aid when not on missions. Or to keep the mcguffin we just brought back. Sometimes she rolls a natural 20...

Although, if you aren't considering the skills as being a balancing factor, is there any reason to play a rogue over say, a barbarian? More hit points, damage doesn't require flanking, and they can do more damage reliably. 2d12+8 (21 average) per swing is solid when compared against 4d6+4 (18 average). Plus options like a 6d6 AoE breath that doesn't increase MAP. Or reach weapons combined with attack of opportunity.

So while we could argue the merits of each class, it looks like to me Superbidi was describing his own character which probably was built to be a party face, capable in all sorts of social interactions with maximum charisma and combined with a lot of expert skills. And was designed to be a ranged attacker instead of a melee attacker. Of course that is a lot of assumptions on my part.

A sorcerer might not be able to fill those out of combat needs as well due to a lack of skill breadth and depth.

I don't think you'll find anyone who disagrees with your assessment that a thief rogue in melee and benefiting from flanking does more damage than a scoundrel rogue at range.

Even SuperBidi in the posts above says that if you want a traditional rogue that flanks, you shouldn't play a scoundrel.

Yeah and thats why I am asking him if he is benefiting from sneak attack with that spell due to his DM. So I know for sure. Because I can tell you right now it seems questionable because it would struggle to benefit from free sneak attack damage. Which I think is important.

I dunno, even without sneak attack, that is a fine attack routine.

Take level 2. Assume you've got 2 targets within 30 feet. Assume your character's stats. 10 Str, 18 Dex, 18 Cha.

So compare 3 bow strikes with sneak attack against bow with sneak attack and cantrip without sneak attack, against level 2 moderate AC and moderate reflex save, so 17 AC and +8 reflex save.

Base to hit is +2+2+4+1=+9 to hit for the bow, DC 18 for the spell. 1d6 base damage on bow, plus 1d6 for sneak attack is 2d6 per attack. Spell is 1d4+4 to two targets, and 1d6 for one attack.

First attack hits on a 8, crits on a 18. Second attack hits on a 13, crits on a 20, and third attack hits on a 18, and crits on a 20.
0.8+0.4+0.2=1.4 times base damage, or 1.4*7=9.8 expected damage.

Cantrip does no damage on a 20, half damage on a 10-19, full damage on a 2-9, and double on a 1. To two targets.

So 0.8*7+0.75*6.5*2 = 15.35 expected damage. Against a single target, it drops to 0.8*7 + 0.75*6.5 = 10.475.

So in situations where there are 2 targets within 30 feet, the cantrip and no sneak attack is significantly better than 3 attacks with sneak attack. And to be fair, the lone bow shot should get sneak attacks if the other routine is getting them.

As you go up in level, this changes, but it remains reasonable.

6th level its more like 2d6+1d6 rune + 2d6 sneak against 4d4+4 times 2 plus 2d6+1d6+2d6.

Bow is at +6+4+4+1=+15. Spell save DC is +6+2+4=22. Against 23 AC and +14 reflex save.

So 1.4*17.5 = 24.5 expected damage for 3 bow shots. 0.8*17.5 + 0.65*11.5*2 = 28.95 expected damage against 2 targets, or 21.475 damage against a single target.

Still competitive in terms of expected damage, even without electric arc benefiting from sneak attacks.

Im confused why you need to be a scoundrel Rogue for what you have laid out.

Is your DM allowing you to get sneak attack from Electric Arc? Because it's not a spell attack roll, and therefore gains no benefit from magical trickster. Also couldn't literally any racket do as you have laid out? You just admittted you don't even use the feint feature which is kinda the point of my post. There is nothing unique about the subclass, and there is nothing you have described that is complex.

If you're not rolling your stats (PFS, certainly my home campaign is using the base build rules), scoundrel lets you start with an 18 in charisma rather than a maximum of 16. 2 points for race, 2 points for background, and 2 points for one of the four free boosts for a normal rogue is the max. So their electric arc is better with Scoundrel, as it does +1 more damage and has +1 more to hit at levels 2-4, and then 10-14, and finally level 20, assuming you're boosting charisma at 5,10,15 and 20.

So for 9 out of 20 levels (roughly half the game), scoundrel is superior with sorcerer dedication cantrips. +1 to hit, better save DCs, and slightly better damage is the reason.

He might not have taken magical trickster with his build. I was the one that mentioned using it with Ray of Frost. What he does get is a full damage cantrip and a bow attack with no multiple attack penalty. He said the biggest benefit over the other rackets was the extra skill for him (i.e. Deception + Diplomacy vs just Thievery or just Intimidation). As you note, none of the rackets combat abilities help with that routine, but scoundrel helps him more out of combat (plus charisma in combat).

2) Their Racket gives them the ability to make someone Flatfooted against every attack you make for two turns, meaning they don't need support from teammates to set up Sneak Attack, and the Crit Success result is a solid debuff when it lands. This feature also means they're one of the better Racket options for ranged Rogues, as they can more easily take advantage of the debuff Feinting applies and don't need to spread out their physical stats as much.

I'm a bit confused by this, given feinting doesn't apply to non-melee attacks, unless there's a feat I've missed. I think all the rackets are potentially equally good at using a bow, since none of their traits apply, no? You also need to be within melee range of the target to feint and generate the benefit.

However, Rogues do still have access to Divert (Deception roll, they get +4 circumstance bonus if you've already done it to that particular target in the last minute), as well as Hide (Stealth) if there's cover and can add the cover bonus to the stealth roll, so certainly ranged rogues are a good option.

I agree with SuperBidi that a Scoundrel/Sorcerer build can work quite well, especially after 4th level. If you add spell slots with further feats, you can start to mix illusions or other concealment producing spells in to allow you attempt to hide no matter what (or just straight up make you hidden).

Even a simple 1st level Illusionary Object spell can create the illusion of a wall or small building without windows (or maybe arrow slits?), completely blocking LOS and making you hidden to sight, while still allowing you to attack a target multiple times until they spend actions to move over and interact with it, or spend an action seeking it (turning it into a mass slow for 1 round). And even then, its not guaranteed if they roll low on their perception check.

So its totally possible to take Magical Trickster and sneak attack each round with cantrips. Electric Arc + Bow will probably average more damage if you have a way to get sneak attack on the bow automatically, such as with the aforementioned illusion. But Divert/Hide + Ray of Frost also works out to 120 feet. Nothing preventing you from taking both cantrips.

As for the feinting ability of the Scoundrel, I see it bringing more to the table in a party with fewer front line martials and more arcane/primal casters (reflex save spells) and ranged rogues (perception penalty). Also an alchemist in the party can make Poison Weapon go from terrible to OK-ish as it can be used to deliver at level injury and contact poisons created for free every day. Normally an alchemist can't put a contact poison on a weapon, but a rogue can.

Scoundrel rogues also have the capability of being the best party faces outside of combat. Lots of skills, lots of skill feats, and potentially max charisma. Of course, that benefit is highly dependent on the campaign and the GM. In campaigns that are designed to roll with it, it can be awesome and memorable. I've been in campaigns where we've deceived our way through the front door of the evil empire's base, and all the way to our objective.

Lycar, I wanted that fight, but basically only with boss monsters.

I wanted to curb stomp most other encounters, and have an occasionally heroic encounter with someone(s) the parties equal. As a GM I knew how to make that happen, though it wasn't easy. However, since it was basically just at significant plot points it wasn't overly difficult to do, but definitely required invested time.

In PF1 making a challenging fight took work on the part of the GM.

In PF2 they don't really need to do anything, maybe place your party against a couple level+2 enemies. But for players to survive they need to get lucky and work incredibly well together. And that's definitely a shift from how my group got used to playing. PF2 has been terribly lethal, with our GMs often going..."Yeah, we're not going to do X the way it's written because I think you all will die, at least one of you. And since no one has access to life restoring magic...that would leave one of you out for a while."

So why not just fight groups of Level-3 and Level-4 enemies when you want to feel heroic? Between level 6 and level 14, there is an 11 to 12 point difference in AC and saving throws.

10th level martial (10+4+5+2=+21) against 6th level moderate AC hits on a 3, criticals on a 13. Same martial against even level opponent hits on a 8 and criticals on an 18 (your 65% number). Against a 14th level boss fight, they hit on a 14, and critical on a 20.

Level 10 enemies are not CR 10 enemies from PF1. Moderate encounters in PF2 are not Average encounters from PF1. An NPC with character classes in PF1 was level+1, and level+2 if they had gear equivalent to a player (i.e. their magic weapons are up to date - which is true of all enemies now). So that fully equipped 10th level wizard that was a CR 12 enemy from PF1 is now a level 10 enemy in PF2.

There are 5 tiers of encounters in both systems, but try lining up the names sometime.

Easy vs Trivial. Average vs Low. Challenging vs Moderate. Hard vs Severe. Epic vs Extreme.

So another way to think of it, all those moderate threat encounters are "challenging" situations. They're supposed to make you work. The low threat encounters used to be the average one you'd encounter in PF.

If you want encounters to make you feel heroic, have more "trivial" and "low" encounters. Instead of two equal level enemies, have three level-2, or better yet, six level-4. Now you're defeating more enemies than your party with little to no effort.

From the core rule book on encounter design:
"Trivial-threat encounters are so easy that the characters have essentially no chance of losing; they shouldn’t even need to spend significant resources unless they are particularly wasteful. These encounters work best as warm-ups, palate cleansers, or reminders of how awesome the characters are. A trivial-threat encounter can still be fun to play, so don’t ignore them just because of the lack of threat."

If those are the encounters you like, talk with the GM, or run them as the GM. Its not a question of the system, its a question of picking which encounters to create.

What the PF2 system is much better at is having consistency across monsters and encounters. When the encounter includes two level 10 enemies, you know how hard it is. In PF1, two CR 10 enemies could have wildly different difficulties if they were say, wizard or fighter NPCs.

Edit: Is the issue because the label "Level-3" and "Level-4" sounds weak, when in reality they're not?

If all the character was doing was sustaining a cantrip every round and moving, it should not be fatiguing.

The Repeat a Spell action, defined on page 480, can be used to sustain. If you look at the sidebar on page 498, it suggests actions which involve 10 actions per minute (i.e. sustain once per round), is non-fatiguing. A quicker pace, (i.e. 2 actions per round), might have limited use or cause fatigue.

So if they're casting Dancing lights (2 actions) once every 10 minutes, then using sustain a spell once a round (10 actions per minute) for 10 minutes, it shouldn't be fatiguing, as that averages really close to 10 actions per minute.

It is the same reason using Repeat a Spell for the Shield spell (1 action cast), shouldn't be fatiguing either when used for more than 10 minutes.

"At the end of your turn, you can choose to rewind time back to just after you cast time beacon,..."

Since you rewind to the moment after you have already cast the spell, you obviously don't get the spell back.

So, right after you cast time beacon, you're under the effects of time beacon, no? I agree the intent is you don't get the spell back, but all effects you're under at the time immediately after casting should still be there, no?

Consider the following situation.

The enemy has put a sickened 1 effect on you and your ally cast Physical Boost on you, which ends at the end of your turn.

Action 1: Cast time beacon.
Rewind point: Just after action 1 you are sickened 1, under the effects of Physical Boost until end of turn, and under the effects of time beacon until end of turn.
Action 2: Fort save to remove sickened, fails.
Action 3: Fort save to remove sickened, succeeds. No longer sickened.
End of turn, choose to rewind, go to rewind point.

Rewind point: You are sickened 1, under the effects of Physical Boost, and under the effects of time beacon until end of turn.

Thats the problem. If you rewind to the point just after time beacon, you are still under the effects of time beacon and haven't expended its use.

Or would you have the character rewind and no longer be sickened nor under the effects of Physical Boost?

Its needs errata to say that you rewind to the point just after you cast the spell, but no longer benefit from it after rewinding. I think that an errata like that was what writer was aiming for, but as written, it certainly can be interpreted the way the Excaliburrover presents it.

It depends a lot on the wand or staff.

Staffs specifically require that you spend spell slots to charge them, making them more of a side grade. While wands do act as more of +1 spell/day.

Sorry, I'm confused by this statement, and want to make sure I'm not missing something. You get free charges equal to your highest level spell everyday in one staff, whether you are prepared or spontaneous.

Page 592:
"During your daily preparations, you can prepare a staff to add charges to it for free. When you do so, that staff gains a number of charges equal to the highest-level spell slot you have. You don’t need to expend any spells to add charges in this way."

If a prepared caster wants, they can choose to sacrifice a spell slot to add charges.
So at 11th level, a staff defaults to 6 charges for a full caster, with no sacrifice. If he sacrifices a 3rd level spell, he has 9 charges. If he sacrifices a 6th level spell he's got 12 charges. But he can always choose to just get the free 6 without spending anything.

I'm not seeing how that is a side grade. It is directly comparable to +1 spell/day of your highest spell level, assuming the staff is of high enough level.

Aratorin wrote:

In Exploration Mode, if no PC is using the Search Activity, the Invisible NPC would be Unnoticed.

Why if I might ask?

In my opinion if you are invisible and not sneaking successfully (or not trying to sneak at all) you will be prone to imprecise senses (e.g. hearing) and will immediately become hidden once in hearing range, even without any active search.

Its kinda implied by the invisible condition:

While invisible, you can’t be seen. You’re undetected to everyone. Creatures can Seek to attempt to detect you; if a creature succeeds at its Perception check against your Stealth DC, you become hidden to that creature until you Sneak to become undetected again. If you become invisible while someone can already see you, you start out hidden to the observer (instead of undetected) until you successfully Sneak. You can’t become observed while invisible except via special abilities or magic.

You don't need to sneak while invisible to be undetected. You're undetected to everyone unless they use seek to detect you using your Stealth DC (or you started out visible in front of them, then turned invisible). The invisible one isn't the one rolling, its the seeker. Once you are simply hidden, then you start needing to roll Sneak.

This is of course will interact differently with creatures with precise senses other than sight, but as written, an invisible creature doesn't need to make stealth rolls unless they want to become undetected again.

Thats why a character needs to be using the search activity to make you hidden. Its more of a GM's call if you transition from unnoticed to undetected automatically, or if you need to make stealth checks versus perception, or the GM makes hidden perception checks against your stealth DC. Thats a bit unclear to me.

This is also why Bast is confused. If you are rolling sneak, a failure means you are only hidden. An undetected invisible creature doesn't need to roll to remain undetected. They need to roll sneak only to transition from hidden to undetected. And thats why the failure mode makes sense. If you fail or critical fail sneak trying to go from hidden to undetected, you remain just hidden.

But when would something like that ever actually happen in roleplaying games? The heroes are almost always pitted against small groups of enemies (a dozen or less) at relatively close ranges (within 100 feet).

When you get to mass battles, like your theoretical example, that's usually when completely separate (and oft-simplified) mass battle rules come into play.

I didn't present the situation, I merely analyzed the implications. Ubertron_X said a 3 hour battle and 1797 rounds, implying a martial would be far more effective than the wizard, and thus implied it should be a balancing point. I was curious if that was true, given the best case assumption in favor of the fighter. And even in that case, it doesn't seem to hold.

If it never occurs in play or is unrealistic (i.e. say it take 30 seconds to resolve a round of combat for the GM and players, then it stands to reason a 3 hour battle would take 15 hours straight to complete, not to mention be the most boring thing ever after awhile), then it is reasonable to assume it shouldn't be a balancing point.

I happen to agree with you as I've never been in a session or campaign that had something done that way. I've been in plenty of sessions where there was a single combat in a day. Or only 2. I've been in climatic end boss raids where there's were 5 combats in single day, but at that point you're pulling out all the consumables and expendables since you know its going to be rough going in, and we definitely prepared for it.

I believe the expectation is 3 or maybe 4 per day on average, with fewer per day being much easier with casters going nova, and more per day meaning you pull out those expendables you've been hoarding for the last 3 levels. Certainly I've had far more 1 battle days than 5 battle days in PFS and SFS. So far in PFS2/home campaign, our GM hasn't thrown more than 3 encounters a day at us from level 1 to 3, but of course that might change once we get back to playing.

Ravingdork wrote:

One thing I haven't seen mentioned yet (in this thread) is that spellcasters aren't meant to do the damage of martial characters. If they did, there'd be no point in playing a martial character. Why would anyone want to play a damage dealer when they could be a damage dealer AND manipulate reality?

Lets count the damage and kill figures in an all afternoon battle, aka after the wizard has had his 3 rounds of fireball, lets see what the martial can do in the additional 1797 rounds of this 3 hours long battle. Note that this is not to question PF2s design decision, just to show a long time "selling point" of martials as far as RPGs go and that is often overlooked when just taking a look at skirmish level damage meters: Staying power.

This seems like a fun mental exercise. Ok, so 3 fireball wizard implies level 5. Given you've mentioned 1797 rounds, that implies non-stop combat without 10 minute rests, since clearly the fighter is fighting in all of them. Given they've got to last 1797 rounds, that means melee or returning thrown weapons since ranged weapons will run out of ammo. So lets assume a 2-handed d12 weapon wielding fighter.

So +5 (level)+6 (master)+4 (strength)+1 (rune)=+16 to hit. 2-hander does 2d12+4=17 average damage. 1-hander 2d8+4 = 13 average damage

AC is full plate, so 5+2+6+1+10=24 AC. Will assume 18 Str/12 Dex/14 Con/10 Int/14 Wis/10 Cha for stats, so 8+5*12=68 hit points. We'll assume fleet, so 25 movement speed, with sudden charge.

Let throw them up against hobgoblin soldiers (a proper giant skirmish against an army of hobgoblins), 1 at a time. These are CR 1, so level-4 opponents, 1 at a time. As easy as it comes. We'll assume the hobgoblins begin by shooting at 60 feet with their shortbows, then drop the bow, draw sword and start swinging after being engaged.

3 attack shortbow expected damage from hobgoblin: 1.675.

Fighter moves (to 50' from 60'), then sudden charges. 57.5% of the time, he'll kill the hobgoblin in 1 blow. So 42.5% of the time, the hobgoblin will draw their sword, and swing back 2 times, dealing on average 2.625 damage. We'll just assume the fighter's next 3 attacks finish the hobgoblin.

So, expected damage per encounter is about 2.79. At 68 hit points, the fighter lasts through 24-25 hobgoblins before dropping, over the course of 36 rounds or so. For an effective 500 damage (25*20 hit points), which is pretty impressive. Although 216 seconds, or about a minute and a half isn't really anywhere near 3 hours.

Depending on enemy density, a fireball in a battlefield situation might catch a shield wall or archery line (given Hobgoblins get a benefit for having at least 3 of them adjacent). Certainly against martials, grouping up is better than spreading out and coming at them 1 at a time.

Hobgoblins have a reflex save of 6+2 (formation)=+8, against 6d6 fireball. Lets assume there are lines of archers, so a 20 foot burst, increased to 25 with widen spell, hits 10. Damage is capped at 20 per target, since that is all they have. Spellcaster has a save DC of 21. Assuming average damage rolls, so 6/10 fail or crit fail, 3.5 succeed, and 0.5 critical succeeds. Times 3 fireballs on 3 different groups gives, 18*20=360 damage. 10.5*10=105. Total damage is 460, 18 defeated and 10 at half hit points in 3 rounds.

Seems pretty comparable given the wizard still has 2nd and 1st level spells after bombing the archery line from outside their attack range. I mean, the fighter probably appreciates not taking 30 ranged attacks a round and the survivors splitting up so they come at the fighter 1 at a time.

If the wizard happens to be a spell blending evoker at 5th, they can cast 5 fireballs for 775 damage in 5 rounds, taking out 30, and severely wounding 17. That is basically basically soloing an entire platoon of the enemy in 30 seconds.

How did you see a 3 hour non-stop battle playing out?

In regards to multiple backup magic weapons, I suggest having a caster in the party invest one of their 1st level spell slots in magic weapon, or invest in a couple cheap wands or scrolls of it. For literally half the game, level 1-10, its going to give you the same to-hit bonus.

At level 11 and above, the 100 gold for the +1 striking runes isn't going to break the bank on a couple backup weapons, and is probably worth the action economy savings. Although you'll be down 1 to hit and a damage die, but a 10 or 15 point resistance/weakness is going to still be worth switching over for.

Hiruma Kai wrote:

Not sure why my numbers seem to disagree with your chart's level 10 and 11 calculations. It is possible I made a mistake, but I'd love it if someone points it out to me. Or perhaps note the different assumptions I've made?

You've forgotten to add Precision damage on the second attack and third attack if the previous attacks misses.

You're right, I did. Although looking at that, its a relatively small expected damage increase. 0.35*0.45*4.5=0.70875 for a 2nd attack at 10th and 0.6*0.35*0.2*4.5=0.189 for the second, so roughly a 1 point difference in the cumulative damage for 3 attacks.

My bigger issue is using 55.0 damage for non-precision criticals instead of 50.5 in the calculations apparently.

So I went to code it up real quick in python, including the precision applying to first successful hit, and fixed the 55 to 50.5 assumption of non-precision critical damage.

Level 10, precision
1st:24.675, 2nd: 12.68375, 3rd: 5.52425
Cumulative 2nd: 37.35875, Cumulative 3rd: 42.883

Level 10, flurry
1st: 21.075, 2nd: 14.675, 3rd: 10.625
Cumulative 2nd: 35.75, Cumulative 3rd: 46.375

Flurry wins out on 3rd or more attacks, precision wins on 2 or fewer. Even if you drop 1 shock rune, this stays true.

Level 11, precision
1st: 28.275, 2nd: 13.3925, 3rd: 5.8235
Cumulative 2nd: 41.6675, Cumulative 3rd: 47.491

Edit: Had left the lack of a shock rune in the calculation I first posted for level 11.

Flurry remains the same. In which case precision not quite but almost ties flurry on 3rd attack. Precision pulls ahead slightly on 3 attacks.

My guess is the equipment rune assumptions are affecting this compared to the charts.

One the bright side, I think the Dev's did a good job on the math for this, as precision and flurry seem to be comparable, while also having interesting differences. Flurry for example becomes more powerful with buffs like haste, while Precision is going to be stronger if you've been slowed. Flurry will be better if you are exploiting a weakness to silver, while Precision will be better against enemies with resistance (although not immune to precision damage for obvious reasons).

Edit: An interesting point of comparison is the 3rd flurry attack is worth roughly 83% of the precision's 2nd attack in terms of expected damage. Also, if you take the 1st shot with a precision build, and know you hit, then you know your expected damage for your 2nd shot is only

1- To second Kyrone, animal companions don't get counted in XP budget.

2- Define combat changing in your opinion? Is Darkness combat changing? Terrain effects? Movement? Buffs? Some kind of combat where damage isn't the point? Character abilities are extremely wide ranging, and some change combat a lot (especially control and buff spells).

3-The numbers work out that way because the players get 15 action (potentially 15 rolls) against the monsters 3 actions. A +4 boss is an extreme encounter and is expected to have 50/50 odds of just wiping the party.

If you start providing extreme encounters regularly, the PCs will eventually start dying when their luck proves lacking. And given enough encounters it will.

That said, what level are the PCs currently? If you're really aiming for an extreme encounter for 5 that would push most groups to the edge, but not 1 giant monster, you'll want an intelligent group that works together with tactics. By working together, lower level enemies can become force multipliers.

Assuming they are level 2, and you want a lethal extreme challenge, something like the following would work:

Drow Priestess (level 3, 60 xp), 2 Drow Fighters (level 1, 30 xp each), and 2 Drow Rogues (level 2, 40 Xp each), total of 200 xp (160+40 for 5 players).

If they're level 3, then add another Priestess and Fighter to get back to 200 xp.

Its got darkness which changes the entire nature of the fight against PCs without darkvision, providing 50% miss chances all over the place and enabling sneak attacks. Any of the enemies can cast it, which makes it hard to fight it with light cantrips. They have solid spells like Fear and Command which put PCs out of position (command a wizard to come here so he runs into the a bunch of fighter AoOs and perfect flanking for rogues). It has slowing poison (and if you fail 3 times, you're out), solid melee and range capabilities, and they're faster than base line PCs.

Sure, they are player character like enemies, but player characters are strong.

Personally, I would expect most groups encountering walking into that kind of fight to simply lose.

Remove the 2 fighters to drop it to a rough severe encounter for 5 PCs. At that point action economy starts to help the PCs, but it is still a tough fight. Stealth initiative + Darkness + poisoned crossbow volley at effectively blind characters is a nasty start, for example.

The second encounter of the campaign (vs some deserters turned bandit, level 1 fighters with bad gear) started like 20-30 feet away after some discussion failed. One of the bandits immediately got in the face of the ranger, who then felt very ineffective because A, the volley trait on his longbow was hindering him and B, he didn't want to provoke for firing. In fact, after the battle he decided to switch to a shortbow but still felt like maybe he should just go melee so he got a strength bonus to his attacks (even getting a composite bow only gives half strength).

Just to comment on this, I'll note switch hitting rangers are a classic build.

A Ranger has no reason not to have both a short sword and a composite longbow. They have identical to-hit bonuses, assuming their Dexterity is their highest stat. Both can use Dex for their to-hit bonus and benefit from strength for damage (bow to a lesser extent), and both benefit from Hunt Prey + Flurry.

I'd recommend the Quick Draw feat at level 2 in that case. That way at ranges 30 feet to 0, they use the short sword, and at longer ranges they use the longbow, and reduce action costs to switch.

Keep in mind, a shortsword can be used even with 1 hand on the longbow, so no need to stow it or drop it. The only inefficiency comes when you want to go back from melee to ranged by stowing the shortsword, but that is no different than using a move action to get back into melee with the next target.

Aratorin wrote:

Even without storing any of his gear in the backpack, he only has 4.2 bulk of gear total, which rounds down to 4, not up to 5.

Cookware and instrument alone are 3. 6 units of rations and 4 waterskins are another 1 bulk (so 4). Then it looks like he has another 10 items of 0.1 bulk, so 5. Can you explain your numbers?

Apparently, neither I nor Aratorin looked at the left side of the sheet. My guess is we're both used to listing the total weight on the right rather than a per unit basis, which makes it easier when summing up just by looking down 1 column.

So we only counted 1 week worth of rations and 1 water skin. And I only counted 1 set of sling bullets. I take it this is some kind of deep wilderness adventure? A month and a half is a pretty long adventure away from civilization.

So with that correction, I agree I see 20 light items, which is 2 bulk plus the 3 from the instrument and cookware.

Interestingly, as soon as he eats 1 week worth of rations, it will drop to 4 Bulk and 9 light items, and thus round down to 4 bulk.

So if he traded a crossbow and and 20 bolts for his sling and 20 sling stones, he'd be at 2.7 + 1 + 0.2 = 3.9. Leaving him a 2 full bulk under his 5 bulk (and up to 9 light item) limit. So even without the backpack rule he could pull it off.

Aratorin wrote:

Sorcerer's don't need Material Components at all, and can use their Blood as a Focus. They aren't Clerics who study and worship a god, they are literally related to Angels.

Mentioned the blood bit and not needing the pouch and he said "I still think it is good to have for various foci."

Just to clarify, a material component pouch only provides material components. Any spell foci still has to be acquired and paid for separately. Foci can also be pulled out, used, and put back as part of casting the spell, even without a material component pouch.

It is fine if he wants to have it on him, and use it to make others think he's a wizard or cleric instead of a sorcerer, or some other RP purpose, but it is not actually usable for foci.

Hiruma Kai wrote:

At which point instead of using goblin warriors, you use goblin commandos. Identical ranged damage

Which is weird to me. Unsure why the creature half as strong is exactly equal on ranged weapons there. Very glass cannon/spike damage issue.

Triple the hit points and a melee attack which does roughly twice as much damage on average. As noted elsewhere, goblin commandos are more balanced in their attacks, while goblin warriors are primarily ranged with a really high stealth for their level.

Its the kind of the same reason the Ogre warrior has a +12 1d10+7 melee attack, but only a +6 1d6+7 30 foot ranged attack. The goblin commmandos and goblin warriors have a higher to hit than the Ogre in terms of ranged attacks, yet are lower level.

Also, they weren't all spread out in a forest, some were in a cave. There's a mix. And even the "long range" encounter started about 80ish feet away I think, well within range of Ray of Frost and the first range increment of crossbows/longbows.

Although, now that I think about it, goblin warriors only have a stealth of +5. I suddenly find myself wondering how you settled on 80ish feet away? That sounds pretty optimal for short bows. Just far enough to prevent a first turn move, move, strike, but close enough to only suffer a -2 ranged attack penalty. The players have a ranger and rogue in the party, which means minimum perception DC is 15 for at least two characters in the party, if not higher with wisdom.

Are they making 4 stealth rolls against the player's best perception DC each time to get that optimal range?

If they were detected at say a 200 foot range (-6 range penalty for shot, the 2nd attack wouldn't be able to get a critical against AC 18 even with a natural 20 (potentially the paladin or monk has this AC or better), and the 3rd wouldn't critical against AC 13 (which is basically trained unarmored AC and no bonuses). Alternatively, if they move up and then shoot, that is 4 or 8 fewer arrows on the 1st round. Giving the players more time to prepare before weathering 12 attacks looking for 20s.

At that point, weathering 40 total arrows isn't actually so bad if the characters have cover due to terrain. Alternatively, start them at 25 feet or less away from one of the melee (especially if they fail to notice a rogue using Avoiding Notice). At 6 hit points, a 16 strength gauntlet wielding rogue could deal 1d6+1d6+3 in a single strike on the 1st turn before the goblins act and take 1 or 2 out.

Starting ranged enemies at exactly their optimal range is like starting melee enemies already in melee. Its a force bonus.

In the cave situation, I'm guessing lighting is an issue giving away their presence, as I doubt the entire party has darkvision (awesome if they do though). Although there's the possibility of hearing the goblins walking around the corner out of LOS, allowing a start to the combat without players being able to be shot instantly.

So other options to tweak encounters are to change the environment and tactical situation, to make it easier or harder. Start the players in cover or concealment relative to the enemies, or have the encounter start at non-optimal range for the enemies. Start enemies in a non-combat stance, without their weapons in hand and far from each other. Or string them out, like having the goblins out at 85, 130, 185 and 200 feet for example.

I asked him about cantrips and the crossbow, here is his reply:

"Second level feat will help with the cantrips, and <character> is currently carrying his light encumbrance limit."

Here's his current inventory. My gut instinct is he really doesn't need 60% of his bulk spent on an instrument and cookware.

https://i.imgur.com/t3fpfTF.png

I realize this probably isn't well advertised, but the developers acknowledged some issues with encumbrance and changed a few things with the first set of PF2 errata.

I point you at the paizo blog with link to pdf at the end in it:

https://paizo.com/community/blog/v5748dyo6sgzq?Core-Rulebook-Errata-Round-1

Specifically on page 3 of the errata, bottom right:

Page 287: In the Backpack description, add this
sentence: “The first 2 Bulk of items in your backpack
don’t count against your Bulk limits.”

He's should have 2.9 more bulk to play with (0.1 to 0.9 bulk rounds down, I count 2 + 1 + 0.1 x 11 = 4.1 bulk on that sheet). With the ignore 2 from the backpack, his current effective bulk is 2.1, rounds down to 2.

This also updated on the Archive of Nethys site if you use that under backpack.

Unfortunately you shouldn't need to go to external PDFs or ask the forums to find this out, but its there.

Gaulin wrote:

I think the solution here, if your players aren't feeling heroic, is to explain to them that they aren't heroes at level one. They're adventurers, but they've done little to no actual fighting and they have no experience.

I guess that seems to be conflict with some of the backgrounds like Bounty Hunter, Gladiator, and Warrior for example.

Unfortunately, for balance reasons, those backgrounds make you just as dangerous as someone with an Artist background.

Even starting with a 200 year old elf doesn't get you any more skills than a human despite having likely lived 10 times longer.

Another possible suggestion is if they're not having fun with 1st level characters, skip directly to 2nd or 3rd. That way they can have a Gladiator or Warrior background and have stats to back it up immediately. As it is, any "Warrior" type enemy like an Orc Warrior or Hobgoblin warrior is a CR 1 enemy and thus has decent odds of beating a player character 1 on 1, warrior background or no.

Unless this is some form of pre-designed adventure, bumping up levels by 1 or 2 shouldn't make the game too much more complicated while providing more of a hit point buffer. Level 1 just happens to be the most luck based level in my opinion. Luck still matters at higher levels, but it takes more of it to drop a player immediately.

"All I know is that I'm not having fun. It creeped on me on the last session where we scrapped by just barely, it happened again today within the first round. I know how childish this sounds, but I'm tired and I don't feel at all like a hero, let alone an adventurer. Is ending every single encounter with a dead person something that really inspires confidence?. Yeah, nobody died, but only because of that hero point thing and that only means that you just have to double tap us to end things instead of normally killing us."

Actually, it's more like a quadruple tap, plus get through the hero point, but yeah, I take their meaning. There's a reason hero points are in the game. To prevent you from dying to lucky criticals like this when no one can get to you. Hero points are integral to the game and it was balanced with them in mind.

When I hear "nobody died, but only because of that hero point thing", it sounds like "nobody died because of that armor class thing" to me. However, I can understand how other people might view the hero points as an arbitrary mechanic.

A player's fun is their own subjective perspective, and if they're not having fun, they're not having fun.

So yeah, change up the enemy tactics or change the enemies. Javelins was a good suggestion. If the players are more focused on the roleplay and feeling of how tough their characters are, play to that.

Alternatively, change the characters and jump immediately to 3rd level, where there's a larger hit point buffer and damage averages out more. At which point instead of using goblin warriors, you use goblin commandos. Identical ranged damage, identical numbers of enemies, identical experience, but your players will have twice the hit points or more.

And my players are specifically raising the complaint that they don't feel heroic when they haven't ended a fight without someone on the ground. And I doubt they'll feel heroic if it's the six of them beating up two goblins...and even just two goblins could still drop one or more people with some lucky rolls.

Just making sure I'm getting all those negatives right (negate don't with haven't):

You're saying they would feel heroic only when they have ended a fight without anyone dropping?

If their expectation is that people shouldn't drop when an enemy critical hits, I don't think that is necessarily an expectation the rules support at level 1. Its not just shortbows. Most CR 0 or CR 1 enemies on a melee critical are doing like 2d6+6 or 2d8+8.

It sounds like the party overall is still winning these fights, and no character(s) have has actually died, right? I think that is in fact the expectation.

Its even more true for a 6 person party instead of a 4 person party.
Larger parties means there can be more focus fire on a single member of the party from the larger, balanced opposition, making it more likely that single member goes down.

Four goblin warriors crit fishing against a party of six is more likely to drop someone than three goblin warriors crit fishing against a party of four. Fewer attack rolls on the goblins part, so only 9 chances of rolling a 20 instead of 12.

If your players don't like having someone sometimes drop against 4 goblin warriors as not heroic, I'll simply point out 4 goblin warriors are worth the same XP as a single Ogre Warrior (four level-2 are worth one level+2). And if an Ogre warrior gets even 2 attacks off, let alone all 3, someone is dropping in the party (+12 to hit, 1d10+7 damage).

I'd ask your players if they expect no one to sometimes drop when up against an Ogre warrior? Its still a low threat encounter for a party of 6.

As for practical tactical decisions before they get to act, I have a question for you. Do you allow your player's characters to take reactions before they have acted in those encounters? If so, there are exploration activities which will help a lot.

If they have a shield, they should be using Defend, for the +1 to +2 AC, and more so for the shield block ability. A steel shield can block a 22 damage crit, reduce it to 17, and still be able to be repaired later. Probably only applies to the Paladin, although in principle any of the melee characters could reasonably use one, even without shield block, for the extra +2 AC at the start of a fight.

The wizard and sorcerer should be using Repeat a Spell to have the Shield cantrip up. That will boost their effective 1st turn hit points by 5. Sorcerer would need to take 8 (human?) + 6 + 2 + 5 = 21 damage to drop on round 1. Possible, but highly unlikely on 2d6+1d10 (about 1.1% chance).

A Rogue using Avoid Notice should have good odds of not being spotted by goblin warriors at the start of combat (Perception +2 versus trained stealth of +7?) in addition to straight out winning initiative.

Someone using Scout also boosts the party's initiative by 1, to help beat the goblin warrior's +2.

Those are some things the characters could do to minimize first turn initiative wins plus random criticals by opposing ranged striking groups.

So i'm looking at converting some P1 weapons to P2 for a campaign setting that I am working on. The problem I have with advanced weapons that quickly became apparent is that they are a tier of weapon that, barring certain conditions, no one can really use except for fighter.

While it is not currently an issue because of the 4 advanced weapons that I am aware of (from the core rulebook), are racial weapons. But the sawtooth sabers show the issue that future weapons are going to run into. Unless some specialized feats come out to allow other classes to use them, advanced weapons are not going to useful to anyone but a fighter unless they have some sort of racial link to the weapon.

I will note, if your concern is converting Pathfinder 1st edition weapons to Pathfinder 2nd edition weapons, that exotic weapons don't automatically convert to advanced. Most pathfinder 1st edition exotic weapons are uncommon simple or uncommon martial weapons. Some are just straight up plain martial, like the bastard sword.

Kama, nunchaku, spiked chains and so on are simply uncommon martial weapons.

So its possible when you write up the old 1st edition weapons in 2nd, you could simply make them uncommon martial weapons.

Of course, that means keeping in mind balance considerations. Advanced weapons have larger damage dice and more or better traits than their martial counter parts. The developers clearly had some kind of point budget combined with certain over arching rules for each of the 3 tiers of weapons (simple, martial, advanced). For example, no simple or martial agile weapon has damage dice larger than 1d6. No simple or martial 1-handed finesse weapon has damage dice larger than 1d6. Even if the budgets looks like they should allow them.

Sawtooth sabers are essentially a straight upgrade from short swords in the vast majority of cases (only where an enemy has resistance to slashing but not piercing would they be better). After the 1st attack, sawtooth saberes are effectively 1d6+1 damage die instead of 1d6, better than any other agile weapon.

Similarly, the Aldori dueling Sword is the only 1d8 1-handed finesse weapon. These are straight up higher damage versions of their martial equivalents.

At high levels, proficiency in such weapons is like having PF1 weapon specialization and greater weapon specialization (+4 damage on Major Striking weapon for example) compared to their martial weapon counterparts. Weapon proficiency is, as far as I know, the only general feat that can increase your effective damage with every Strike you make (at least at levels 1-4).

So its not just a question of concept, but also a question of becoming the optimal choice for more damage.

Which is why I think the developers made the decision to have scaling proficiency beyond trained to cost class feats, not general feats. Class feats tend to offer improved combat performance, while General feats seem to be more defensive or utility focused. If a general feat was introduced at 7th or 11th level to provide expert or scaling proficiency, it starts to become an optimal feat for combat for all classes using weapons.

Of course people might disagree with that assessment, but I can certainly see why the developers went the way they did. There's a certain logic to it.

As it stands a fighter's advanced weapon proficiency for all weapons outside their chosen group scales as:
Trained 1-12
Expert 13-18
Master 19-20

Any martial class that gains master martial proficiency at 13th by spending 1 general feat, then retraining out and spending 2 class feats, can achieve:
Trained 3-11 (1-11 if human)
Expert 12
Master 13-20

That looks useful to me, especially in the 1-4 and 12-20 levels, where an advanced weapon is going to be straight up superior to the martial weapons. Of course, 2 class feats tends to be worth more in terms of combat power than 2 general feats, so its a harder decision to make I think.

I don't think we should compare to a fighter's chosen weapon group proficiency because then you'd need to factor in a ranger using hunter's edge, a rogue using 1d6-4d6 sneak attacks, a barbarian using dragon rage for +16 extra damage (8 more than the fighter's weapon specialization), and so on. Its not a fair comparison to just look at the proficiency in that case, since a fighter's higher than normal weapon proficiency is what they get instead of hunter's edge flurry benefit or sneak attacks.

So basically, you have to be some form of fighter to be able to effectively use advanced weapons that you can't learn through your heritage. That feels, quite flawed.

Given the fighter class is all about using weapons, why does that feel flawed?

I mean, you're essentially asking for a general feat to provide some variation on military level training (possibly provided by an army, marital monastery, lone wandering knight, etc) to be able to effectively use an usually difficult to master weapon. Personally that sounds like fighter training to me.

However, there are other options, more akin to an English Longbowman growing up with the weapon.

For your human example, Unconventional weaponry would work for the dwarven battle axe. If it was an elf, they could use Adopted Ancestry to grab the dwarven weapon familiarity feat at 5th.

Sawtooth saber would require the multiclass fighter dedication though.

Is there a particular build you're working on that this is causing a problem for or breaking its concept in some way?

Assuming 3 viable targets for a wizard is somehow more reasonable than a barb being in melee with 2? Not in my experience. Landing an aoe on 3 targets in more than the opening round is extremely unlikely unless your GM likes running monsters poorly.

Two in melee with barbarian, sure.

But that is not the requirement to use Sweep. Two enemies in melee with barbarian and adjacent to each other is the requirement, and that is easily prevented by the GM, unless you want to start spending actions on moving enemies around. Or if your GM is running them as less tactically proficient I suppose.

The only reasons I can see to have melee enemies keep themselves adjacent are:
1) They have an ability that benefits from that adjacency
2) There's too many of them to space themselves out and attack their target(s)

But in case 2, all the barbarian needs to do is step away 5 to 10 feet with their 3rd action, and the delaying Wizard can toss a fireball 15 feet in the air and catch 3 or more enemies in a 20 foot by 20 foot square.

We're only at level 3 at the moment, but I can't see a 500 foot range, 20 foot radius burst (44 squares on the ground, scalable to 4 squares on the ground with a 20 foot high air burst) being less flexible than a melee range and adjacent to each other targeting restriction.

In the last home campaign session I was in, we were level 3 (Fighter /w Wizard dedication, Cleric /w Champion dedication, Champion, Bard) ambushing a patrol of 6 Orc warriors outside in a forest. Totally fireball formation at the start, and then continued to have a front line that a fireball would have fit into perfectly. As it was, the Bard cast Illusionary Object (2nd level), also a 20 foot burst spell, putting half the Orcs under the illusion of a stone dome. Which ate up a bunch of enemy actions trying to disbelieve it. Although that is assuming we read "can't ignore an illusion without successfully disbelieving" and "feels right to the touch" correctly.

In 2 more levels, the Cleric of Sarenrae will be tossing fireballs instead of burning hands. Coupled with Illusionary Object "Wall of Stone" choke points, that should be a pretty good combo in the level 5 to 6 range I think against enemy groups.

If you're willing to consider heightened spells, Illusory Object cast at 2nd (or higher), can be fun, since it basically includes all the basic senses (sight, hearing, touch, smell) and lasts an hour.

Typical combat use is to use it like a wall spell, except its shape and material are more flexible. 20 foot burst gets you 44 squares to work with, which could be a perfect spiral, forcing a medium sized enemy (or multiples of them) to waste a number of actions to get out unless they try to touch it, or actively use a seek on it. Worst case it eats up at least a single action as they interact with it or seek against it (not unlike a successfully saved slow).

Or to create a hazard like a trap of some form.

Of course, enemies trained in Occult can spend an action to Recall knowledge to identify it while being cast that it is an illusion spell instead of a wall spell. On the other hand, if its pre-cast and you draw them into it, then they really do need to touch it for some reason or use Seek on it to even be allowed to disbelieve.

1 hour duration makes it potentially useful for things like ambushes or negotiations.

MaxAstro wrote:

For me, turning an 80% chance into a 100% chance is something I value as a very strong benefit, because failing "sure things" bothers me more than when I take a risk and fail.

Except that it's more like turning an 80% chance of (crit-)success into 100% chance of (non-critical) failure.

Assure-Man: "Man, I'm sure glad I have Assurance (Athletics)! I can't fall down this cliff!"
Buddy, at the top: "YOU CAN'T MAKE PROGRESS CLIMBING UP IT EITHER, MEATHEAD"

I mean, I guess its fine for low-threat challenges, but if its only good at low-threat challenges, why do we need this feat per skill?

Probably because that is only half the feat's benefits. The other half of the feat's benefits is ignoring penalties or when you're doing chains of checks it doesn't reduce your total odds of success. One way to turn a low-threat challenge into a high-threat challenge is to add detrimental circumstances on it or chain a bunch of them together. Like disabling a complex device or climbing a 100 foot tall cliff.

If the cliff is 100 feet tall, and assuming Buddy has a 30% chance of critical success, 50% chance of success, 15% chance to fail and 5% chance to critical fail, then the odds of making it to the top without falling are around 40% or so. Rolls of 1 do happen, and you need on average 18 checks to make it the top (assuming you don't roll a 1).

If buddy has an 80% chance (i.e. succeeds on a 5 or higher), and this is mid level (i.e. maximum stat bonus is +5), then Assure-man will make it to top of that cliff 100% of the time, even with no investment in strength.

Then there's case of trying to do it in a hurricane which makes the wall wet and buffets the climber in high winds, while in the dark, and while enfeebled 2. At which point Assure-man still makes it up that 100 foot tall wall. If those penalties add up to -8 or -10, I wouldn't be betting on Buddy getting up that wall.

The developers come out and say they didn't list all effects an area of effect spell might have.

To add to the rules quotes from page 456.

Many area effects describe only the effects on creatures in the area.

Just because they didn't list an effect of an area of effect spell, doesn't mean there shouldn't be one. Or how else does one parse the above text?

That is then followed up by the already mentioned quote:

The GM determines any effects to the environment and unatteneded objects.

The rules do not say nothing happens to environment and objects. The rules also do not say something happens. They are explicitly making the GM answer that question. There's no default for the GM to fall back on.

An unattended table not taking damage is as much as a decision as for it to take damage and break. Certainly the former choice is more immersion breaking than the later. However, both choices are equally valid for the GM to make, with neither being more right than the other.

If I'm in a society game, and someone casts fireball that includes open barrels of lamp oil and an overturned table, I'm going to have the barrels light on fire and I'm going to compare the damage to the table's estimated hardness and hit points. Why else would they put those things in the scenario? I'm curious if people in this thread would object if I did that?

Perhaps a better question is, how many in this thread would choose not to do so? Are we talking about some hypothetical GM who would prevent a chair from taking damage if that was the entire reason the spell was cast?

I personally like the idea of Stride, Trip, Strike, Stride on a fast martial for a blend of offense, debuffing, and damage mitigation against melee heavy opponents. Or maybe Stride, Improved Knockdown, Stride for a mid-level fighter with reach weapon. Stride (and thus Haste) has both offensive and defensive applications.

...That's an issue? A level 20 creature using its once per year spell to strike people with a piece of wood which does less damage dice any of its unarmed strikes? That is a point of concern to you?

Sorry, I was not very clear. The issue was with simply placing an extraplanar tag in general, not the Pit Fiend casting Shillelagh. A general listing of extraplanar creatures in the rules or even a simple trait can't possibly work.

Simply stating devils are extraplanar, for example, is wrong when on the plane of Hell. And players themselves might have the tag. Extraplanar is relative to where everyone is at the time. Applying and removing a trait all the time seems a tad silly, and potentially confusing.

I was trying to provide an instructive example of both in one and simply showing how the rules would work. I couldn't think of any extraplanar creature that could cast Shillelagh off the top of my head, and miracle happens to be able to duplicate the effects. I am not advocating that this is a likely occurrence in game, merely how the rules would be applied if it did.

So the current method of traits indicating the home plane is sufficient and direct enough for new players to figure out, or at least I think so.

Is there any place in the printed 2E rules that specifies which creature types are extraplanar? Shillelagh does extra damage against extraplanar creatures but I cannot find an official explanation of extraplanar. As a long time DM I know which creatures are extraplanar but new players might have some confusion. Seems like an oversight for a game that has neatly defined traits on just about everything.

I think the issue is that a Devil on its home plane of Hell is not extraplanar. And in fact, a Pit Fiend could duplicate Shillelagh with Miracle (for example) and get to roll 3 dice against the players while in Hell, assuming none are native to Hell themselves.

I suppose they could have add a section on extraplanar in the Bestiary like they did in PF1, which describes how you gain and lose that trait.

The individual race traits (elemental, demon, devil, fiend, celestial, angel) in their description indicate which plane(s) that type of creature comes from. Devils from Hell, Demons from the Abyss, Fiends from evil aligned planes in general, Angels from Nirvana, Celestials from good aligned planes, and so on, so there's certainly some information for new players to go on.

Yes, because logically people can look for threats while also sneaking.

It was also possible in 1st edition. Having the limitation exist at all just seems, well, arbitrary and unnecessary.

It's not about getting my cake and eating it too, but about having the game's rules better represent cinematic reality and not breaking immersion for seemingly no reason.

Ultimately, I'm just trying to find the rationale behind it, as exploration mode is one of the few things about 2nd edition that feels really gamey and totally breaks immersion for our group.

But you are looking for threats while sneaking. Its not like you don't notice them, you simply get a +1 initiative bonus when using the Scout option. Which specifically is described as moving ahead and behind the group (and presumably the left and right). If the group is striding forward, and you're using half speed stealth actions, its a bit harder to perform that circle of the party as often.

If you're spending your entire time in front of the party, that +1 doesn't make much sense when the enemies come from behind or to the right.

You could of course, ask them to move slower so you can actually make that kind of loop while stealthed. Which is exactly the kind of thing beowolf99 describes. I personally consider the Scout action to be Stride (move around the party) + Stride (move forward).

Assuming 2 sneaks = 1 stride, an avoid notice scout would end up being something like:
Round 1: Sneak + Sneak (equivalent to the first Stride)
Round 2: Sneak (standard avoid notice action)

So 2 rounds, with only 1 round of forward motion, at 1/2 speed results in 1/4 speed.

So talk it over with your GM.

As for in world rationale, a +1 circumstance bonus doesn't necessarily mean no attention, it means you're not giving it 100%. Legendary stealth characters have stealth as second nature, they don't need to think about it anymore, but everyone else still needs to actually look at how the shadows fall on themselves every so often instead of looking to the horizon.

Although I do have one in world question. If you're ranging in front of and behind the party while stealthed, how are you communicating the sudden presence of enemies from your stealthed state to your allies in all cases on a split second timescale?

Presumably you want to be stealthed from enemies on the opposite side of your party, which means in some cases being stealthed from your party. Do you yell, breaking your own undetected condition?

The magical staves in the book all do have the staff trait.
So I looked it up and there lies the item/weapon trait that gives them the ability to cast spells, which they lose when you shift them.

Why would the weapon lose the "staff (trait)"? The "staff (trait)" is clearly different from the staff (weapon) form, since staves (weapon) do not generally have the staff trait. They are simply two unfortunately named concepts, completely distinct.

I'll note on page 592, under attacking with a staff, it says:

"Staves are also staff weapons, included in their Price. They can be etched with runes as normal for a staff. This doesn’t alter any of their spellcasting abilities."

I would argue etching and using a shifting rune on the staff should not cause it to lose the "staff (trait)", since otherwise that would go against "This doesn't alter any of their spellcasting abilities".

For the whole "shifting staff to 1-handed weapons" concept, does that let them cast True Strike while the staff is shifted into a sword? Is that intended or just clever reading of the rules?

The developers tend to be pretty explicit when effects or abilities get suppressed (polymorph spells for example).

"The weapon takes the shape of another melee weapon that requires the same number of hands to wield. The weapon’s runes and any precious material it’s made of apply to the weapon’s new shape. Any property runes that can’t apply to the new form are suppressed until the item takes a shape to which they can apply."

The rune notes that property runes that can't apply are suppressed. It doesn't indicate any other effects, powers or benefits should be suppressed.

As far as I know, staves (the weapon, not the magic item), don't have a unique trait or property that lets them become magic staves. Magic staves simply happen to be staff weapons with extra magic properties. So if the base were to become something else (like a sword), then there's no reason the magical properties would cease working because of weapon type.

It seems like a pretty straight forward reading to me. Do you know of a rule that makes you think it wouldn't work or know developer intent from some other source?

When I read the sorcerer spell casting section, I'm struck by the way spells and slots are phrased.

From the sorcerer casting section:
"Each day, you can cast up to 3 1st level spells."
Here, I place emphasis here on the fact that your slots are the spell levels. It is not this number things that can filled, having 3 1st level slots is literally you can cast up to 3 1st level spells per day.

Further down in the sorcerer rules it makes this more explicit:
"The number of spells you can cast each day is called your spell slots."

So let us use the same phrasing for a 3rd level sorcerer instead of a 1st level, at least as I see it:

"Each day, you can cast up to 4 1st level spells, and up to 3 2nd level spells"

So asking, "Can I use a 2nd level spell slot to cast a 1st level spell?" is like asking "Is casting a 2nd level spell the same as casting a 1st level spell?", and the answer looks like a no to me. Heightening is the mechanism which raises a 1st level spell to 2nd level, and then the statement "Can I cast a 2nd level spell as a 2nd level spell?" becomes sensible (if admittedly as a tautology).

Another way to put it, is if you try to cast 5 1st level spells in a day, then you're trying to go over the limit of 1st level spells you are allowed to cast per day. Doesn't matter that you can cast 3 2nd level spells. A 1st level spell is not a 2nd level spell. You'd need a mechanism like the Wizard Spell Blending arcane thesis to add/remove spell slots (castings per day) of different levels.

I think this also makes clear what an appropriate spell slot is. If you want to cast a 2nd level spell, well, thats clearly 1 of your 3 castings of 2nd level spells per day. It is not 1 of your 4 castings of 1st level spells per day. They don't need to say it is of the same level as the slot, and not lower or higher, because "X 2nd level spell slots" is simply short hand "up to X castings of 2nd level spells per day".

So again, 4 1st level slots means you can cast up to 4 1st level spells a day. There is no trading down functionality I can see in the rules. If there were, it be worded something like you can trade a 2nd level slot for a bonus 1st level slot, along the lines of the Wizard Spell Blending arcane thesis.

I think this is also related to known spells. You can't learn a lower level spell in a higher level slot. You always learn the heightened version. There's no provision for knowing five 1st level spells and two 2nd level as a 3rd level Sorcerer. You can't because a 1st level spell is not a 2nd level spell. At best you can learn a 2nd level spell and make it a signature spell, allowing for lower level casting in 1st level slots as well as 2nd.

Anyways, thats my take on it. On the other hand, I certainly don't see as a problem if a GM house rules you can cast lower level spells as higher level spells without heightening. It raises the versatility of the spontaneous casters relative to the prepared casters, but not by a game breaking amount I think.

A Warpriest can't do anything against a Nalfeshnee. He will never get to melee range. So, it will be a healbot. That's the issue of the Warpriest without Wisdom, you end up being a healbot as soon as the fight is not extremely simple.

I recommend any melee based character to always carry a backup ranged attack. Let assume this 10 Wisdom cleric started as human, and had 16 Str/16 Dex/14 Con/8 Int/10 Wis/12 Cha at 1st level, and by 15th has 20 Str/20 Dex/18 Con/10 Int/10 Wis/18 Cha. At which point, picking up a backup +2 striking longbow at 15th level makes a lot of sense. Thats only ~1,020 gp out of ~13,500 gp. Cold iron arrows are dirt cheap at 15th level (2.01 gp per arrow, 50 are only ~100 gp). Might as well carry a set of each cold iron, silver, and normal (~201.5 gp total).

Nalfeshnee have an AC of 34. 20 Dex warpriest rolls 15+2(trained)+5(dex)+2(rune)=+24. Hits on an 10 or higher. Better than 50/50 odds.

Lets take that general purpose Iomedea spell list I presented earlier, and assume they have divine weapon (as a melee warpriest that seems like a given).

Divine Weapon + Any spell (i.e. true strike, heal, etc) + Cold Iron arrows means 2d8+2 (piercing/cold iron)+1d6 (good) +15 weakness vs good + 15 weakness vs cold iron. Average damage is 44.5. Criticals only deal 64.5 on average though.

One shot expected damage (say with a heal): 0.5*44.5 + 0.05*64.5 = 25.475 expected damage
Second shot (say on a true strike or 1-action focus spell turn): 0.25*44.5 + 0.05*64.5 = 14.35 expected damage

Potentially 39.825 expected damage from 2 actions + 1-action spell. On a true strike + strike + strike turn its roughly 51 expected damage.

The Iomedea spell list I presented can do that for 3 turns (3 true strikes) for roughly 153 expected damage. Given its a party of 4, such a warpriest is expected to do its share of 1/4 of the enemy's hit points (720 hit points for 2 Boar demons) in 4 turns (using Athletic rush1-action heal on the 4th to trigger on turn 4). Not too bad for something that is supposed to be a worst case scenario. Using only 1st level spells and focus spells. And if it is being a healbot, thats still ~25-40 damage a turn on top of healing 36-100 damage a turn.

I think that particular healbot is doing reasonable damage, even with a backup weapon against demons. Note, I have used nothing here that wouldn't be useful against other types of enemies as well, and no spells slots above 1st level other than heal spells.

A high Wisdom Cleric on the other hand will cast Searing Light for crazy damage + good weakness or Divine Wrath if he can get the 2 Nalfeshnees in the area for average damage + good weakness. So, the Nalfeshnees will have to deal with him as he is clearly killing them quickly.

Searing light is a terrible general purpose spell. Its great for fighting undead and demons. Against other targets it is 1) Single target 2) Requires an attack roll against AC, so failures do nothing, 3) Does less damage than fireball (5d6 vs 6d6, both get 2d6 per level), and 4) is medium range at 120 feet.

The problem against Devils is they are nearly all immune to fire, making it only deal 5d6 + 2d6 per heightened level damage.

Sure its good if you know what you're getting yourself into, but a warpriest with the same information would likely tailor their spell list and/or equipment as well (i.e. emblazon on the bow with 10 minutes of effort for an extra 3.5 per shot).

Can you present a level 15 general purpose spell list this cloistered cleric would generally have memorized, as opposed to one optimized to specifically fight demons? We can also use it to consider how often a cleric is going to be able to cast counteract spells on level.

Edit: Forgot divine weapons requires spell slot spells, focus spells don't work. 1-action heal does though.

Level 15 is where the difference is likely to be biggest for the war priest completely dumping wisdom. Assuming that I wanted to be a Warpriest that deliberately tanked my WIS, choosing a race with WIS as a flaw and never invested in it. I am curious for folks to put together an ideal spell list for this single-class character. Including spells from level 1 to 8. I don't mean to put this out confrontationally. I am just interested in seeing where the first character shines when they're save DC and spell rolls are at a +19 vs a cloistered cleric who started with a 16 WIS (so not even maximized) and boosted it to a 20, who has a +26.

Depends on your deity of choice and how you approach combat. Lets take Iomedae for example.

Level 15 Spell selection:
Cantrips: Shield, Detect Magic, Guidance, Stabilize, Forbidding Ward

1st: True Strike x3
2nd: Enlarge, Faerie Fire, See Invisibility
3rd: Heroism, Disrupting Weapons, Comprehend Languages
4th: Air Walk x2, Freedom of Movement
5th: Death Ward, Breath of Life, Endure Elements
6th: Heroism x3
7th: Divine Vessel, Energy Aegis, Regenerate
8th: Righteous Might, Divine Aura, Heal x5 (assuming 18 Cha at 15th)

Focus Spells assuming you take the feats: Athletic Rush (+10 speed), Enduring Might (DR 21 vs 1 attack)

The spell list works a bit better with a Fighter MC + Opportunist feat to grab AoOs, since it has a number of options to increase the size of the Cleric and provide reach.

If you've got 2 rounds to buff, 8th level Righteous Might + 6th level Heroism is hard to beat, with a net +28+2=+30 attack modifier at 15th, dealing 3d8+15+1d6 good. And can still use your shield and cast spells. Its got some prep time, but that is pretty respectable when compared to a 1-handed fighter's +30 (15+8+2+5) and 3d8+13+2d6 elemental.

Ok, let's have fun.

Let's consider the Warpriest to be the main frontliner of your Warpriest, Rogue, Sorcerer, Alchemist party.
I'll take Hiruma's first level Warpriest and a Bugbear Tormentor (Moderate encounter for a first level party). The Bugbear Tormentor inflicts, on average, 19.025 damage to the 18AC, 17HP Warpriest with a 3 attack routine. A 2 attack routine inflicts 16HP, it's not the third attack the important one. So, your Warpriest will hardly be able to hold the line one round, and once down, your Rogue, Sorcerer and Alchemist will have hard time removing the 40 HPs of the Bugbear. Your party has hard time dealing with a Moderate encounter...
And the Warpriest needs to spend one round casting Magic Weapon for tough encounters? I'll give you a hint, he'll never be able to do it.

Warpriests are not main frontliners. If you don't have a Fighter, Monk, Barbarian or Champion to hold the line, your party is a bunch of victims. And it's far better to have 2 of them at least, as monsters can score critical hits.

Its an interesting scenario, but the assumption of the enemy showing up under a single move action away seems more like an ambush than a normal encounter. Generally as a GM, if I'm giving a significant tactical advantage to the enemy such as a ranged enemy in a hard to reach elevated position or a strong melee monster starting in melee range, I treat the encounter as harder than would be implied by just the CRs. Similarly if I give the party an advantage like having a ranged player party starting 500 feet away against a melee/short range enemy, or high up on that cliff instead, I would treat the encounter as much easier.

For example, take an Elven Wizard and Sorcerer by themselves, one Elven with base speed 30 and the other with fleet/dangerous sorcery. And drop the Bugbear tormentor at a distance of 175 feet. Bugbear moves 75 feet closer, range 100. Both cast 3-action magic missile, dealing 22 total damage (3d4+3 and 3d4+4). Bug bear moves 75 feet closer. Range 25. Both cast 3-action magic missile, dealing 22 total damage, dropping the bugbear. If you're concerned about cover and sight lines, then they can kite for 10 minutes until said sight lines are right since they're faster than the bugbear at 30 feet versus 25 feet per action. Plus magic missiles only care about total cover.

That is an APL+4 encounter for 2 squishy casters, solved without taking a hit simply because of the starting range. Clearly, starting distance and spell selection is a huge factor in encounter difficulty.

I'm also curious why you didn't let the warpriest use the defend exploration activity in this scenario? That would leave their AC at 20, instead of 18 before their first turn. If you're denying them exploration activities, this sounds like an ambush, and should be a higher difficulty encounter than indicated purely by CR and XP budget.

If you do let the warpriest use the Defend activity, I calculate the expected damage to only be 12.55 assuming a move + twin feint on the bugbear's part, assuming it won initiative (roughly 57.25% chance given the bugbear's perception/stealth +8 versus the warpriest's +7 perception), and assuming the GM is disallowing reactions before a character acts in this scenario.

With the defend exploration activity, the warpriest's AC before his turn starts is 20.
+11 vs AC 20, hits on a 9, crits on a 19.
(0*0.4 + 1*0.5 + 2*0.1)*8.5 = 5.95
(0*0.5 + 1*0.45 + 2*0.05)*12 = 6.6
Total expected damage is: 12.55

Although perhaps a better metric is the % of combinations that leave the warpriest standing at the end of round 1. The combination odds are something like:
20% both miss (0 damage max, still standing)
43% chance 1 hits and 1 misses (16 damage absolute max, so still standing)
22.5% both hit (26 damage absolute max, 20.5 expected - only 4 out of 96 damage rolls still standing or about ~1%)
7% one crit/one misses (32 absolute max, 24 expected or 20 max, 17 expected - about ~1.75% expected still standing)
7% one crit/one hit (42 absolute max, 32.5 expected)
0.5% both crit (52 absolute max, 41 expected).

So assuming reactions are not allowed, in about 35% of damage rolls the warpriest goes down. This is to be compared to about 22% chance of damage rolls where a 21 hit point/same AC character (i.e. a fighter with shield up) goes down on round 1. About 1 in 8 encounters with a Bugbear tormentor the fighter will fare better than the warpriest on turn 1, assuming no shield block.

Of course, if reactions aren't allowed, and the bugbear is so close, why is the bugbear going after the armored characters and not the unarmored/lightly armored casters? I presume the warpriest is leading out front by a move action or something? So 25 feet or so in front?

Anyways, if this is a normal fight and not a surprise ambush, and reactions are allowed, the warpriest can reduce damage by 5. Now about 22% of damage rolls the warpriest goes down, while the fighter drops in about 10% of damage rolls. Again, about 1 in 8 encounters you'll notice a difference between the fighter and the warpriest on turn 1.

If you give me the Wizard, Sorcerer, and Alchemist team, then bugbear is down on turn two as the Warpriest heals and raises shield again on turn 1 if still standing, Wizard and Sorcerer cast 3-action magic missiles on turns 1 and 2, and the alchemist throws a bomb or two.

That is basically automatic damage of 12d4+12 plus 2 splash for 44. So with the warpriest as the "front liner", and the wizard, sorcerer, and alchemist as a backline, I would expect victory by turn 2 roughly 80% of the time (i.e. the warpriest is standing at the end of round 1). Using a fighter front liner (+5 perception vs +8 stealth) and same backline, I'd estimate victory on turn 2 at around 85% of the time.

I estimate this based on the fact that the warpriest wins initiative and moves to a distance of 35 feet, suffering at most 1 attack, dealing at most 20 damage, with 5 mitigated by shield on turn 1 42.75% of the time. 57.25% of the time the bugbear wins initiative from its surprise 25 foot distance or less, and even then the warpriest has a 66% chance of staying standing without a shield block.
0.4275 + 0.5725*0.66 = 0.80535 which is approximately 80%.

If the warpriest goes down on turn 1 (~20% of the time), then it becomes a question of the exact builds involved. Is the sorcerer occultist or arcane? What bombs does the alchemist have? Tangle foot? What is the speed of the characters? 20, 25, 30, 35 feet per action? The probabilities and possibilities become much more complex.

If we sub in the rogue for the Wizard, then expected damage on a 2 action attack flank on turn 1 is about 9.9 (assuming thief/18 dex) instead of 10.5. Turn 2 becomes tricky as the bugbear may attack the rogue instead of the warpriest, although then the warpriest is free to pull off an attack + chill touch, for expected 8.3 on turn 2. Sorcerer pops off another magic missile that turn for 10.5.

So 39.2 without the alchemist so far expected. 4 bombs over 2 turns will probably put it over 44 with good odds (since you get 1 spash on a fail). Or if the sorcerer has dangerous sorcery pushing the magic missiles up to 11.5 average, or 41.2 expected without alchemist, so 4 bombs should push it over.

Anyways, those are my thoughts on the scenario. Certainly looks beatable the majority of the time to me, although tactically it looks more like a severe encounter rather than a moderate with the Bugbear sneaking up like it does to 25 feet away or less.

Sorry, but you don't manage to make the Warpriest shine with your description. Not being able to deal as much damage as a Champion, having the hp pool of a Wizard during half of your carreer and being down in one round as soon as the enemy gets a bit lucky or nasty is why I consider it quite weak. Not unplayable, but weak.

And I'm playing Plaguestone right now, and yes, our Sword and Board Fighter is down in 2 rounds without healing during tough encounters. So, your Warpriest will often be down in one.

I'll note I merely described the unbuffed melee statistic line and AC. That is not all that a warpriest can do. If you want the full capabilities, you need to do the full write up as well as actually do analysis against actual enemies and consider attack routines. So I've given some thought to a strength based Warpriest build that is different from the Gorum build described here.

Anyways, while the base melee capability at 1st is less when looking without spells, a warpriest can spend spells to achieve a higher single target melee damage output for one fight than a champion and potentially a fighter. At 1st level, consider Magic Weapon + 3 heal spells. Combine with save targeting cantrips (Daze, Chill Touch), or if human, throw in an Adapted Cantrip like Electric Arc.

Here’s a "sword and board" Warpriest of Gozreh build at 1st level that can out damage a 1st level "sword and board" champion or fighter where there are at least 2 enemies without expending resources, and can nova against a boss with higher single target damage, while still having 3 heals spells that heal 12.5 for 2 actions, for potentially 37.5 health in a boss fight, compared to the champion's 6 from lay on hands.

NG 1st level Human Warpriest Cleric of Gozreh.
Str 16/Dex 12/Con 10/Int 10/Wis 18/Cha 12
Versatile Human Heritage (Toughness feat)
Human Feat 1, Adapted Cantrip (Electric Arc)
Farmhand background, Assurance (Athletics)
Warpriest Doctrine (Shield Block, Expert Fort saves)
Skills: Athletics +6, Farming Lore +3, Religion +7, Survival +7, Nature +7, Medicine +7
Spells (DC 18, +8 attack roll):
Cantrips: Electric Arc, Chill Touch, Daze, Shield, Disrupt Undead
1st: Magic Weapon, Heal x3
Attack: Trident +6, 1d8+3 P, throw 20’
HP: 17
AC: 18, Shield +2 AC, 5 Hardness
Fort: +5, Ref: +4, Wil: +7
Equipment: Chainmail (6 gp), Steel Shield (2gp), Trident (1g), Wooden Holy Symbol (1 sp), Adventurer’s Pack (7 sp), Healer’s Tools (5gp)

Lets say multiple lower level 0 Orc Brutes. AC 15, Reflex save +4
Level 1 sword and board fighter (+9, 1d8+4) vs AC 15
(0*0.25 + 1*0.5+2*0.25)*8.5 = 8.5
(0*0.5 + 1*0.45 + 2*0.05)*8.5 = 4.675
(0*0.75 + 1*0.2+2*0.05)*8.5 = 2.55
Total of 15.725 expected damage.

Level 1 sword and board champion(+7,1d8+4) vs AC 15
(0*0.35 + 1*0.5 + 2*0.15)*8.5 = 6.8
(0*0.6 + 1*0.35 + 2*0.05)*8.5 =3.825
(0*0.85 + 1*0.1 + 2*0.05)*8.5 = 1.7
Total of 12.325 expected damage.

Level 1 sword and board warpriest (+6,1d8+3 and DC 18 1d4+4 x2 targets) vs AC 15 and +4 Reflex
(0*0.4 + 1*0.5 + 2*0.1)*7.5 = 5.25
(2*0.2 + 1*0.45+0.5*0.3 + 0*0.05)*6.5*2 = 13
Total of 18.25 expected damage.

How about a level 3 boss like a Centaur. Here, the Warpriest pulls out the magic weapon spell on the 1st turn, and proceeds from there.

Level 1 sword and board fighter (+9,1d8+4) vs AC 22 (shield raised Centaur)
(0*0.6 + 1*0.35 + 2*0.05)*8.5 = 3.825
(0*0.85 + 1*0.1 + 2*0.05)*8.5 = 1.7
(0*0.95 + 1*0.05)*8.5 = 0.425
5.95 expected damage.

Level 1 sword and board champion (+7,1d8+4) vs AC 22 (shield raised Centaur)
(0*0.7 + 1*0.25 + 2*0.05)*8.5 = 2.975
(0*0.95 + 1*0 + 2*0.05)*8.5 = 0.85
(0*0.95 + 1*0.05)*8.5 = 0.425
4.25 expected damage.

Level 1 warpriest magic weapon strike (+7,2d8+3) vs AC 22 and chill touch (DC 18 vs +8)
(0*0.7 +1*0.25 + 2*0.05)*12 = 4.2
(2*0.05 + 1*0.4 + 0.5*0.5 + 0*0.05)*6.5 = 4.875
9.075

If you're going all out on offense, 9.075 > 5.95. Even a double slice fighter, 1d8+4, 1d6+4 agile maxes out at 7.625 for double slice + strike.

If you want a mid-game build, try:

NG 11th level Human Warpriest Cleric of Gozreh
Str 19/Dex 12/Con 14/Int 10/Wis 20/Cha 16
Versatile Human Heritage (Toughness feat)
Human Feats: Adapted Cantrip (Electric Arc), Natural Ambition (Domain Initiate-Air), Multitalented (Champion -grabbing heavy armor trained)
Farmhand Background, Assurance (Athletics)
Warpriest Doctrine (Shield Block, Expert Fort saves, martial trained, expert trident + crit spec, divine expert)
Cleric Feats: Emblazon Armament, Domain Initiate-Nature, Divine Weapon, Advanced Domain-Air, Emblazon Energy
General Feats: Canny Acumen (Reflexes), Fleet, Incredible Initiative
Skill Feats: Battle Medicine, Continual Recovery, Ward Medic, Assurance (medicine), Titan Wrestler
Skills: Athletics (master) +21, Farming Lore +13, Religion (expert) +20, Survival +18, Nature +18, Medicine (master)+22
Spells (DC 30, +20 attack roll):
Cantrips: Electric Arc (6d4+5), Chill Touch (6d4+5), Daze (2d6+4), Disrupt Undead (6d6+5), Shield (15 hardness)
Spells: 1st: Heal x3
2nd: Faerie Fire, See Invisibility, Resist Energy
3rd: Heroism x2, Heal
4th: Freedom of Movement, Air Walk x2
5th: Lightning bolt (10d6), Flame Strike (8d6), Dispel Magic
6th: Heroism x2, Heal x4 (avg 75 hit points per 2-action heal)
Focus 2 point pool, Focus Spells: Pushing Gust, Vibrant Thorns (6 or 6d6), Disperse into Air
Attack: +21 Trident, 2d8 +4 P + 1d6 F + 1d6 C + 1d6 E (23.5), throw 20’
Heroism (6th), Spell cast that turn: total +23 to hit, additional +1d4 force damage (26)
HP: 129
AC:30, Shield +2, Hardness 10, HP 80
Fort: +18, Ref: +17 (19 Bulwark), Wil: +23. (20/19 (21)/25 with heroism)
Equipment: +2 Striking Trident with Flaming and Frost runes (2,001 gp), +1 Resilient Full Plate (530 gp), Sturdy Shield (Lesser) (360 gp), Expanded Healer’s Tools (50gp), Bandolier (1sp), 258 gp, 9sp

The focus spell Disperse into Air is an amazing focus reaction to keep the Warpriest alive against a solo boss. Combined with 2-action heal spells means the Warpriest is likely still standing on turn 3 without support from any other character in such an encounter even if focused on. Max damage roll for an extreme damage level 14th boss is 120 damage, so if you start the fight at full health, even with literally the worst luck, you’re guaranteed to make it to round 2, unlike say a fighter.

Consider a Purple Worm solo boss (level 13), AC 32, Fort +28, Ref +21, Will +21.
Warpriest Strike + Electric Arc
(0*0.4 + 1*0.5 + 2*0.1)*23.5 = 16.45 expected damage from strike
(2*0.05 + 1*0.35 + 0.5*0.5 + 0*0.1)*20 = 14 expected damage from electric arc
30.45 expected damage
2nd strike if hasted by ally
(0*0.65 + 1*0.3 + 2*0.05)*23.5 = 9.4 expected damage

Champion +22 to hit (11+4+5+2=+22), 2d8+5+2+3d6=26.5, 3 strikes
(0*0.45 + 1*0.5 + 2*0.05)*26.5 = 15.9
(0*0.7 + 1*0.25 + 2*0.05)*26.5 = 9.275
(0*0.95 + 1*0 + 2*0.05)*26.5 = 2.65
Total expected damage is 27.825
4th strike if hasted by ally is the same as 3rd strike.

Even Strike + Strike + Raise shield routine is slightly more damage on the Warpriest (25.85 versus 25.175).

Fighter at this point does outpace the single target damage against a boss, and the exact damage output could vary wildly depending on exact build (double slice sword + shield, two-handed reach, trip build, fear build, AoO, etc).

On the other hand, the Warpriest defensive capabilities are much higher than the fighter in such a fight, limiting the Purple Worm to 1 hit per turn against the priest for the first 2 rounds of the fight and preventing Improved Grab/Quick Swallow Hole combos. It is impossible for a Purple worm to focus down the Warpriest since it maximum damage critical is only 110. If the warpriest can't be focused, its 75 hit point average heals means it can be back at full health with a 2-action heal even against typical critical hits (8d10+30->74), leaving the warpriest back at 129 hit points at the start of turn 3 without support from other characters. A fighter or even a Champion with perhaps two lay on hands for 36 hit points each won't necessarily start turn 3 with that many hit points remaining without help from the party.

And the Warpriest still has counters to invisibility, air walk, freedom of movement, dispel magic, and ranged AoE damage options.

Is that a better attempt at putting a shine on a strength based gish Warpriest?

Yeah, that's what I call a bit of Dexterity. You need 12. But below 12, it starts to be low.

And no Con? Low "hit dice" + low Con + no class abilities to endure blows, you won't stand in the middle of a real fight more than a round.

I thought Warpriests get shield block and have heal spells. I'd personally consider those class abilities to help endure blows. I'll also note Clerics are medium "hit dice", not low "hit dice".

As for variations, imagine an armored front liner cleric of Iomedae or Sarenrae.

A fresh 1st level Human Cleric can pull off 16 Str/12 Dex/10 Con/10 Int/18 Wis/12 Charisma without even taking a flaw. 12 Dex lets you max out medium armor AC. Use shield plus 1-handed deity's favored weapon (longsword/scimitar/etc).
+6, 1d8+3 strike with 18 AC, 20 with shield up, 17 hit points (/w toughness). Shield block for DR 5 when shield is up.

Is it as good as martial's stat line? No, but its pretty close.
Take a fresh 1st level human champion with: 18 Str/12 Dex/14 Con/10 Int/10 Wis/14 Cha
+7,1d8+4 strike, with 18 AC, 20 with shield up, 21 hit points (/w toughness). Shield block for DR 5 when shield is up.

If the cleric can't stand in a real fight for more than a round, a champion or fighter can't stand there for more than 2, and likely only 1 as well.

Even at mid-levels, its not that bad. Level 10 Cleric:
Str 19/12 Dex/14 Con/10 Int/20 Wis/16 Cha
118 Hit points, with the same AC as a fighter in medium armor

Level 10 Champion in full plate
Str 20/Dex 12/18 Con/10 Int/14 Wis/18 Cha
158 Hit points, +3 more AC (expert armor + full plate being 1 higher AC)

In terms of hit poitns that is only about 25% fewer hit points (or about 33% more depending on which way you're looking at it). Even at this level if the cleric can't stand there for a round, then a fighter is at best there for 2. Also, given the more mobile nature of combat I feel intelligent enemies will engage a caster cleric throwing heals anyways.

Personally, I'd have the caster use the whip. I'll note the whip is a trip weapon. The trip action isn't based on weapon proficiency but Athletics proficiency. Even if you aren't proficient in the weapon, as long as you have Athletics as a skill, you've got decent odds of doing something.

Certain stat distributions (i.e. 16 Strength, 18 Int) are pretty close to as good as a fighter can get for athletics check. At level 3, a wizard could be rolling +3 (level) + 4 (expert) + 1 (weapon) + 0 to 3 (strength) = +8 to +11 for tripping with a +1 whip.

Compare to their best possible spell attack roll of +3 (level) +2 (trained) +4 (key stat) = +9.

At 7th level, it could be +7 (level) +6 (master) +1 (weapon) + 0-4 (strength) = +14 to +18 with a +1 whip.

Spell attack would be +7 (level) +4 (expert) + 4 (key stat) = +15.

Alternatively, ignore strength and grab the Assurance feat. Against enemies with low reflex saves, you can trip your level or lower automatically.

Another fun fact if you use it before your save DC spells, you can get away with no MAP penalty. Since its a single target action affecting reflex saves, it also ignores most of the benefits of cover.

You don't need to use it every fight, but its not a bad 3rd action option for a caster.

And you can still crit for pretty massive damage. Especially with the correct weapons / runes.

A cir with a maxed out a Greatpick Fighter with +3 Striking, Grievous, Power Attach, Weapon Spec, two elemental runes, and Str 24 (plus I'm sure there's more you could add I forgot) that's an AVERAGE 189 damage, max 282.

That's a full third of even Treerazor's health on one average crit, or more than half on a maxed out one, with a chance to crit on 16+ if there's no modifiers.

I'll take that kind of damage any day.

Just out of curiosity, how is a level 20 fighter hitting Treerazor on a 6 and thus getting a critical hit on a 16+. Treerazor's AC is 54.

Level 20 fighter gets +20 (level) + 8 (Legendary) + 6 (strength) + 3 (weapon) = +37 to hit.

54-37 = 17.

I believe a fighter needs to roll a 17 to hit tree razor at all (assuming no other buffs/debuffs). They have a critical hit only on a natural 20. I think the expected damage in that case is 0.15*66.5 + 0.05*167.5 = 18.35 expected damage for 2 action melee attack.

(4d12 base dice + 3d12 power attack dice + 8 specialization + 6 strength +2d6 elemental) x 2 + 1d12 fatal + 7*4 grevious critical effect = 167.5 average on a crit.

For comparison, a sorcerer with dangerous sorcerery, using a 7th level magic missile slot and 2-actions deals 8d4+15=35 damage, or not quite twice as much expected damage. Obviously more expected damage could be done by using 8th, 9th, and 10th level slots with damage spells, or using 3-action magic missile.

There's also the fact that Tree Razor has AoO and with its +47 to hit critical hits a max AC fighter (10 + 20 (level)+6 (master) + 9 (armor) = 45) on an 8+ with their first attack, and with a 13+ on their second, dealing ~110 on each crit and stunning 2 (no save). Melee characters are likely to go down in 1-2 rounds.

Against extremely high level bosses (APL+5), crit fishing fighters are not the best choice. However, against an on level opponent, like a Pit Fiend (AC 46), that same fighter now hits on a 9 and critical hits on a 19 or 20. Expected damage in that case jumps a lot, up to 0.5*66.5 + 0.1*167.5 = 50 expected damage per power attack. Assuming a silver weapon. Thats about 7 power attacks to take down a Pit Fiend.

Don't get me wrong, fighters are good in PF2, but you might be overselling them a little too much at high level.

Heal Spell 1
Healing Necromancy Positive
Source Core Rulebook pg. 343
Traditions divine, primal
Cast Single Action to Three Actions
Range varies; Targets 1 willing living creature or 1 undead

You channel positive energy to heal the living or damage the undead. If the target is a willing living creature, you restore 1d8 Hit Points. If the target is undead, you deal that amount of positive damage to it, and it gets a basic Fortitude save. The number of actions you spend when Casting this Spell determines its targets, range, area, and other parameters.

Single Action (somatic) The spell has a range of touch.

Two Actions (verbal, somatic) The spell has a range of 30 feet. If you're healing a living creature, increase the Hit Points restored by 8.

Three Actions (material, somatic, verbal) You disperse positive energy in a 30-foot emanation. This targets all living and undead creatures in the burst.

Heightened (+1) The amount of healing or damage increases by 1d8, and the extra healing for the 2-action version increases by 8.

Bolded the heightened statement. A 10th level heal spell as a 1 action cast heals 10d8 (45 average).

A 10th level heal spell as a 2-action cast heals 10d8 + 80, or 125 hit points on average. An elf with a caster class and 10 Con has 126 hit points. A dwarf barbarian, 20 Con, and toughness has 370 hit points.

A DC 40 medicine check (doable at level 20) will heal 2d8+50, or about 57 on a success for 10 minutes of healing effort.

At 20th, a champion's lay on hands will heal 60 hit points.

So barbarians probably want to have a cleric with healing font around, as they require three 10th level spells to go from empty to full in 3 rounds, or about 70 minutes free if someone has legendary medicine plus continual recovery or about 60 minutes if there's a champion in the party.

There are some feats which can affect those healing numbers as well.

So just for the fun of it, I considered how I might approach a caster gish, using sorcerer as a base.

To help counteract the low hit points, we go champion multiclass dedication, for a Redeemer of Gozreh. We grab heavy armor (half plate) and a shield (plus shield spell for another 15 hit points - which for Draconic bloodline gives +1 shield AC plus 1 status AC). Use cross-blooded sorcerer to eventually add heal to spell list. Utilize defensive arcane spells to help avoid or prevent damage such as Resist Energy, Mirror Image, Illusory Creature, Wall of Wind, Invisibility (4th), Fly, Black Tentacles, Repulsion.

Combine with Glimpse of Redemption to reduce to-hit and damage to allies, while grabbing Vibrant Thorns. Casting heal means enemies take 6d6 piercing damage each time they hit the sorcerer for that round.

Rounding it out with Bespell weapon adds a bit of damage to weapon based attacks, and grabbing a staff of divination for an extra 6 true strikes per day (plus optionally See Invisibility). One could also swap the +1 bonus from the staff to the bow to focus on ranged attacks more. We use elf to be able to grab training in a couple martial melee and ranged weapons that jumps to expert at 11th level.

Raw melee combat stats show the build has +21 to hit and 30 AC (32 with shield) at level 11. Compare that to a maxed Champion with +22 to hit and 32 AC (34 with shield).

Lastly, it is a full caster, giving up nothing of its saving throw DCs or spells per day.

So I present the draconic defender of nature.

Elf Warrior Creature 11
Ancient Elf Sorcerer (Champion of Gozreh)
Perception +15, Low-light Vision

Languages: Common (Taldane), Elven

Skills: Arcana +13, Intimidation +22 (Master) +22, Warfare Lore +13, Religion +13, Survival +13, Athletics +21 (Master), Acrobatics +16, Deception +20 (expert), Nature +13, Elven Lore +13, Stealth +16

Str 19 (+4), Dex 16 (+3), Con 14 (+2), Int 10 (+0), Wis 10 (+0), Cha 20 (+5)

Items: +1 resilient half plate (518 gp), sturdy shield (lesser) (360 gp), +2 striking shifting staff of divination (1455 gp),+1 striking composite longbow with 40 arrows (120.4 gp), ring of wizardry (type 1) (360 gp), wand of Longstrider(2nd)(160 gp), scrolls (haste (30 gp), enlgarge (12 gp), invisibility (12 gp), alarm (4 gp), fleet step (4gp)), adventurer's pack(0.7gp), bandolier (0.1gp), writing set (1 gp), ten 5x5x1 inch sections of stone wall under the effect of shrink item in the bandolier, 162 gold pieces, 8 silver pieces

AC 30 (32 with shield); Fort +17, Ref +18, Will +15
HP 105

Speed: 35 feet (25 feet without longstrider)
Melee: +2 striking shifting longsword +21 (versatile P), damage 2d8+4 slashing + Bespell Weapon
Ranged: +1 striking composite longbow +19 (deadly d10, volley 30), damage 2d8+2 piercing + Bespell Weapon

Arcane Spells DC 30, attack +20;
Spell slots: 5 Cantrips, 1st: 6, 2nd: 4, 3rd: 4, 4th: 4, 5th: 4, 6th: 3

Focus Spells (6th): Dragon Claws, Vibrant Thorns

Cantrips (6th): Shield, Electric Arc, Ray of Frost, Detect Magic, Light, Ghost sound
1st level Spells: True Strike, Magic Missile (Signature), Summon Construct, Gust of Wind, Feather Fall
2nd level Spells: Resist Energy, Heal (Heightened, Signature, Cross-blooded), Mirror Image, Obscuring Mist, Illusory Creature
3rd level Spells: Haste, Fireball (Signature), Slow, Wall of Wind, Shrink Item
4th level Spells: Spell Immunity, Lightning Bolt (Heightened, Signature), Invisibility (Heightened), Confusion, Fly
5th level Spells: Chromatic wall, Cone Of Cold (Signature), Wall of Stone, Black Tentacles, Veil (Heightened)
6th level Spells: Dragon Form, Vampiric Exsanguination (Signature), Repulsion, Disintegrate

Ancestry Feats and Abilities: Multiclass Dedication, Elven Weapon Familiarity, Elven Weapon Elegance, Elven Lore

Class Feats: Champion Dedication (bonus), Dangerous Sorcerery, Basic Devotion (Deity's Domain: Vibrant Thorns), Champion's Reaction, Crossblooded Evolution (Heal Spell), Bespell Weapon

Class Abilities: Draconic Bloodline (Black), sorcerer spellcasting, spell repertoire, signature spells, magical fortitude, expert spellcaster, lightning reflexes, simple weapon expertise

General Feats: Shield Block, Toughness, Fleet

Skill Feats: Intimidating Glare (B), Assurance (Athletics), Intimidating Prowess, Battle Cry, Lie to Me

Below you'll find a true strike build I'm considering, taken to level 11. Its more a of a fighter/mage/thief, although I think it qualifies.

Focusing on lighter armor for maximum speed, high strength and dex allows for decent switch hitting. An interesting option presents itself at level 13 with retraining, to grab both sword and bow legendary training via Elven Weapon Expertise. Or keep expert and ancestral longevity and go Universal longevity for wild card skills.

Combat flexibility allows for another fighter feat, probably Sudden Leap for 30 foot jumps vertically on demand. The build can be highly mobile in 3 dimensions.

Elf Martial Disciple Creature 11
Cavern Elf Fighter
Perception +19 (+21 for initiative), Low-light Vision, Darkvision

Languages: Common (Taldane), Elven, Sylvan, Draconic

Skills: Acrobatics +17, Arcana +19 (Master), Athletics +20 (Expert), Medicine +15, Society +15, Stealth +17, Survival +15, Thievery +21 (Master), Warfare Lore +15
At Daily Preparation pick 1 skill to be trained, pick another to go from trained to Expert

Str 20 (+5), Dex 19 (+4), Con 14 (+2), Int 14 (+2), Wis 14 (+2), Cha 10 (+0)

Items: +1 resilient breastplate (508 gp), +2 striking shifting staff of divination (1455 gp), +1 striking composite longbow with 40 arrows (120.4 gp), ring of wizardry (type 1) (360 gp), gloves of storing(360gp), spellbook, wand of Longstrider(2nd)(160 gp), scrolls (fly (70gp), haste (30 gp), enlgarge (12 gp), invisibility (12 gp), alarm (4 gp), fleet step (4gp)), adventurer's pack(0.7gp), bandolier (0.1gp), healer's tools (expanded) (50gp), thieves' tools (infiltrator) (50 gp), grappling hook (0.1 gp), writing set (1 gp), 27 silver pieces

AC 31; Fort +19, Ref +19, Will +17
HP 149

Speed: 50 feet (40 feet without longstrider)
Melee: +2 striking shifting bastard sword +24 (two-handed d12), damage 2d8+8 slashing
Ranged: +1 striking composite longbow +20 (deadly d10, range increment 100 feet, volley 30 feet), damage 2d8+4 piercing

Arcane Prepared Spells DC 25, attack +15;3rd (1 slot) haste, 1st (3 slots) true strike (3)
Note: 2nd level slot given to staff of divination at prep

Cantrips (6th): shield, prestidigitation, light, ghost sound

Ancestry Feats and Abilities: Darkvision, Nimble Elf, Ageless Patience, Ancestral Longevity (B), Expert Longevity

Class Feats: Power Attack, Wizard Dedication, Basic Wizard Spellcasting, Basic Arcana (Expanded Cantrip), Advanced Arcana (Bespell Weapon), Disruptive Stance

Class Abilities: Attack of Opportunity, Shield block, Bravery, Fighter Weapon Mastery, Battlefield Surveyor, Weapon Specialization, Combat Flexibility, Juggernaut, Armor Expertise, Fighter Expertise

General Feats: Fleet, Ancestral Paragon, Toughness

Skill Feats: Quick Jump (B), Cat Fall, Powerful Leap, Assurance (Athletics), Trick Magic Item, Recognize Spell

I don't think so as a correlation for what everyone else is saying, but it's still beyond-ambiguous RAI. I'm fine with the suspension of disbelief in that it's done so fast by someone skilled in emergency medical treatment. It's fantasy after all, right?

I'm not fine with said person doing said healing without appropriate materials and while eating a bag of chip rations and drinking from a waterskin of bubbling soda, especially when one situation that mirrors it directly calls for it and another does not. After all, how are you healing someone with Battle Medicine with no healer's kit or free hands? I want an honest and serious answer here. Are you shouting at the wound and telling it to go away? Are you spitting on it? Smacking someone in the face with your wielded weapon and making the wound all of a sudden not matter by suffering a concussion? None of those work in my book, and usually make things worse based on modern medicinal treatments.

And that seems to be the heart of the matter. What meets the threshold of willing suspension of disbelief for one person does not meet a different person's threshold.

I'm perfectly willing to believe its an encouraging gesture. An up close, "come on" gesture, swinging your sword arm towards the enemies, implying you need to fight harder. The game already acknowledges grit and determination as a component of hit points. So that is my answer. You are of course free to disagree with that answer.

To turn it around though, could you describe an action under your interpretation of the rules (i.e. free hand, need healing kit), with a similarly specific case for me?

Say your fighter friend covered head to toe in steel full plate with helmet down, who just took mental damage from phantom pain. What is the action you're taking? Can't be bandages since you can't actually apply them through the armor. Besides, bandages seem in apporiate for mental damage. Can't be medicines since those take more time to act when taken orally. It also begs the question why can't you hand out medicine ahead of time, like potions. Can't give them an injection because full plate is again in the way.

In that kind of case, appealing to the target's grit and determination seems far more believable to me than some physical object that can't even contact the skin of your target without removing armor.

Genrally the action or item with the manipulate trait calls out if hands (and how many) are needed. Weapons are explicitly 1 or 2 handed. Healing kits explicitly call out 2 hands. Material component spells call out a free hand. And so on.

I'm not aware of any off the top of my head that don't, except possibly the currently discussed battle medicine, depending on your viewpoint.

So I think the gesture/item difference is already spelled out, just not as a tag. In fact most actions/items already have the finer gesture/1 hand item/2 hand item distinction. It also applies to things like the strike action, which uses an item, but doesn't have the manipulate trait.

A interesting manipulate action is Grab an Edge. A crticial success lets you do it even with your hands full. Your hands don't have to be empty, just unrestrained, to attempt it. So making gestures can prevent you from falling.

Its a good example of a non-spell, no free hand manipulate action.

Rysky wrote:

Recipes and blueprints are not a video game dynamic.

Oh sorry. I guess I didn't see all those famous ttrpg using blueprint because I was too busy playing The Witcher and Warframe.

I'm pretty sure recipes and blueprints pre-date the modern personal computer. And I personally use recipes all the time when trying to cook something for the first time (and usually for the 10th time too).

As for famous TTRPG using blueprints, I know of at least one that did something similar and at least explicitly referenced formula.

Way back in the day of 2nd edition AD&D, the guidelines for creating magic items were along the lines of gathering rare components, a lot like a recipe list, made up by your GM. You had to discover how to make magic items. An adventure in and of itself. A lot like trying to track down an uncommon formula.

Opening my ancient copy of the 2nd edition AD&D gamemaster's guide (copyright 1989), on page 87, on the crafting of potions, I'll note:

"As with other magical items, the character must identify and gather the materials needed to brew a potion before he can begin work. The formula can be as straightforward or bizarre as the DM desires."

In that system, it also took 1 day per level of a spell to craft a single scroll of it. Not to mention the time to track down unused exotic quills and the necessary ink. So there's some precedence for taking days to make a single, disposable item.

whew wrote:

When making a stern glance, what appendage is being used to Manipulate?

+1 to this.

For those staunchly opposed to needing hands for Battle Medicine this requirement gets "hand waved".

Well, yes. Battle medicine's manipulate trait could be satisfied with a hand wave. I quote the manipulate rules:

Manipulate
You must physically manipulate an item or make gestures to use an action with this trait.

I note that somatic spells, such as lay on hands, have the manipulate trait, and yet can be done with hands full. Its not a rules contradiction at all. You just need to have hands.

Although I suppose instead of calling it a stern glance, which could be done at range and needs to be seen to work, its closer to a thump of support, which gives it a bit more manipulate and less visual.

Its not a question of can the rules work that way, as there's no contradiction, its a question of believability and what the developers intended.

Either it is an outright mistake, and they should have included all the boiler plate that is included on the Treat Wounds (traits, calling out 2 hands, requires a healer's kit), or it is written as intended, and you head canon however you need to make it believable for you. Neither stance is inherently contradictory.

Either way, you have to assume something fantastical. Either a thump can get someone up and fighting who was going to die in the next 6 seconds, or someone can provide sufficient medical attention to someone who was going to die in the next 6 seconds in 2 seconds in the middle of combat.

Again, it makes as much sense as someone getting up off the ground from dying in the next 6 seconds purely by heroic resolve. I'm surprised more people aren't complaining about things like cloud jump, as opposed to something interacting with nebulous hit points - which somehow never result in permanent injuries despite being 6 to 30 seconds away from death. I mean, why aren't there more one-eyed, one legged adventurer's around? At some point, some things are for ease of play and having fun with a game.