You can choose what caster level you want to create an item at.
A creator can create an item at a lower caster level than her own, but never lower than the minimum level needed to cast the needed spell.
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The FAQ still isn't quite clear on whether demoralizes from different sources increase the effect, or increase the duration.
Voila! There's no longer any reason to care about the order in which a character's levels and features were acquired. Not strictly true - as an example: Rogue(5)/Fighter(5). Average of 5+int skill points/level. But if he took his Rogue levels first, he wouldn't have been able to max out 5+int skills.
I agree with removing Overrun and rolling Grapple/Sunder into one weapon-dependant thing. Also, make it optional, so if they decide they don't want to try and sunder that loot, or don't want to risk being disarmed back, they don't have to. Thirdly: The one last problem though, is succeeding on the attack roll. How do you handle natural 10's that don't beat the target's AC? Does it still count as long as it hit's their touch AC? I would say it just misses, but you still get your maneuvre attempt. Especially when you look at the example given - "opponent dodges, but still loses footing and slips" is an example of a miss being followed up by a successful trip attempt.
If you put 1 rank in a skill, you have one rank in that skill. However, if it is a class skill, you get a +3 bonus to all checks made with it - so it's functionally the same as putting 4 ranks in it was under the old 3.5 system.
I was thinking of Efficient Spell, but rechecking D&DWiki it appears to have a rider prohibiting it's use with a Quickened Spell in the same round.
If, somehow, she is able to charge, then no, because you cannot use Stealth while charging. That's not the question though :) Yes, she could perform a partial charge during the surprise round, and the ogre would still be flatfooted until its initiative count during the first normal combat round.
Between Quicken, and that absurdly broken splatfeat which lets you cast as a move action for +3 spell levels, Vancian arcane casters are just as capable of going nova through a couple of encounters.
(eventually in some cases) That's my point - there is no way for people in the world to know what a particular character would eventually be capable of. Given that a first level cleric can be a priest of a particular faith, it only makes sense to base the "minimum requirement" for priesthood on what a first-level cleric can do. Further, priests are not adventurers, and thus purely military abilities (such as the ability to fight well in heavy armor, spells like magic weapon, and so on) don't make sense as requirements. This leaves a small list of "minimal capabilities" such as performing healing.
So Power points requires more than 1 spell point per caster level?Is there any noticeable difference between spell points and Power Points? Scratch my last statement, I was forgetting the spell point section on damage and caster level.
Is there any noticeable difference between spell points and Power Points? Not as such. The big difference between psions and arcane casters with spell points is that psions need to spend more points in order to get the scaling effects of spells.
A Bard can't mimic a Cleric perfectly -- or as close as this role may require Actually, a Bard can mimic a Cleric "close enough" as far as being a generic priest goes - leading services, performing healing, curing ailments - what other actions do you think a priest of an outlying church should be able to perform in order to be a priest of that church? As long as they are able to care for their own community and perform religious services, then they have the necessary aptitude to be a leader of the faith. Given that the vast majority of clerics serving as priests of outlying churches are unable to raise the dead, saying that "well bards can't raise dead so can't be priests" is completely bunk. And if you're going to argue based on what a character could presumably do later on in their career, then that's an entirely meta argument and thus not relevant to an in-world position.
Most of the "OMG PSIONS ARE OVERPOWERED!!" threads are based on the faulty assumption that the party can have a single encounter and then rest up for the next one. Psions generally can go a whole lot harder than arcane casters and completely destroy one encounter, but if they do they're back to the crossbow for the rest of the day.
No, but at a certain point in their progression there is that expectation. Then perhaps it's just not possible for a character unable to raise the dead to rise to a senior rank within the church? Remember that level is an abstract concept - characters in the world don't have any direct knowledge of what class and level other people are - they only know their (observable) capabilities. Perhaps the "minimal requirement" for a priestess of $DIETY is the ability to heal wounds. That certainly makes sense in-world. In which case, a bard capable of casting 1st-level bard spells qualifies just as much as a cleric capable of casting 1st-level cleric spells.
If the expectations of the world are that a priestess of Lliira can do things a Bard can not, oh say raise the dead, no amount of bluster is going to make anyone think she is a priestess of Lliira. So it's absolutely impossible for a 1st-through-8th level character to be a priestess of Lliira?
If you mentioned coup de gracing a player expect to get flamed. Though, in most situations that weren't already a TPK, having the BBEG go for the coup de grace is significantly immersion-breaking. If you're in a position to be coup de graced, you're already out of the fight. If the BBEG still thinks he has a hope of winning, it doesn't make sense for him to jeapordize that in order to achieve ... absolutely nothing. Because once he wins, that character is dead anyway. Why would he waste a round doing something that doesn't help him defeat the PCs? Having the BBEG coup de grace anyone who goes down reeks of the DM breaking character in order to "defeat" the players. Which is fine, as long as you don't expect the PCs to keep character when they see an advantage to be had.
Unfortunately, your point here is mistaken. You cannot even take the Craft Magic Arms and Armor feat unless you are a spellcaster of at least level 5 - it's a prerequisite for the feat From the PRD: Ranks in your chosen skill count as your caster level for the purposes of qualifying for the Craft Magic Arms and Armor and Craft Wondrous Item feats.
because i feel one rule hinders character development, and roleplay emersion? I would claim that the monotonous "having to use dice to see whether you hit or not" thing does as well. Nothing breaks immersion more than having to break out the dice. And I am actually really struggling to see how disallowing "I have gloves that make me stronger, and a belt that makes me stronger, and a ring that makes me stronger" actually hinders character development.
a Player should be free to build with equipment how they see fit, within the context of the story, instead of being limited by a rule for balance, when that is what the GM is for. I must wonder why you're playing Pathfinder at all then. A player should be free to roleplay how they see fit, within the context of the story, instead of being limited by rules like "roll a d20 and add your attack to see if you hit", and "roll some other dice to see how much damage you do". By your arguments, it seems like you'd be much happier playing an entirely freeform RP, rather than using a game system of any kind.
No. You need to put at least one rank into a skill before you'll get the +3 bonus.
Perhaps I should emphasize one part of my post: Of course you won't get it at the price you want. You'll get it at the market price or thereabouts. yes but the entire world doesn't have a rule that two antiques will do you no good just because it would throw off that value system. That's because the value of antiques isn't because they make you more effective when fighting someone. They are valuable because they are antiques. Not because of some "real-world-mechanical" effect they have on your fighting skills.
And it really isn't an argument, its pointing out the fact that you aren't going to get any antique you want at the price you want Of course you won't get it at the price you want. You'll get it at the market price or thereabouts.
Well you go in there and tell them you want 10 mickey mantle rookie cards and only want them for $10 a piece. This is quite the fallacious argument, and actually supports our view that things have an actual monetary value. If I wandered into a computer store and said I wanted 10 high-end desktops and I wanted them for $10 apiece, how far do you think I'd get? modern R&D research is funded by companies wanting data, so it can contribute to making a product. In other words, it's funded by commercializing the results of research. Like a mage discovering how to make a particular item, and getting his apprentices to churn them out for sale to adventurers.
You can't just walk into walmart and find them on every shelf. No, you walk into an antiques store or auction house. Other than that, it's roughly the same. How is a Wizard going to finance their research and fact-finding? If we want a decent example, compare it to how modern R&D institutions finance their continued research. And what makes you think every Wizard is devoting their entire lives to finding knowledge and doing very little with it? Much like scientists, there are undoubtedly wizards who just want to be able to settle down, have some children, and eke out a comfortable living. And if you can produce magical items, that's a very easy way to earn enough money to get by.
No! antiquity trade works on finding someone that will pay that amount for the item that you want to sell it for, or finding someone who will sell you the item for the lower rice you want to pay. Exactly - it has a value, and it is traded for (more or less) that value. Further, if such items are able to be crafted, then any comparison with historical (and thus long-out-of-production) items is invalid. EDIT: Let's not get on to ad hominims please.
I am referring to the fact that by maintaining a GP value on magic, you have unbalanced the game, now have to bring in another rule to fix it. If you allow crafting of magic items, then such craftable items inherently have a gold-piece value. If you allow trade of magic items, then they inherently have a gold-piece value. That is the way economies work.
There is actually a really easy, utterly straightforward, and logical fix for this, which is: Don't allow magical enhancements to stack with others of the same type.
and How often the GM decides to let something like that drop. You mean how often the DM allows downtime for crafting. if you go anywhere around people sooner or later someone tougher than you Considering all your stats would be in the hundreds, I'm not sure how this would happen.
I'm not sure why that would happen. Are you suggesting that the evil DM Avatar would come along and smite down the player for taking the sensible course of action in regards to magical enhancements?
Also remember that a slotless item can be something like an ioun stone. How many of those can orbit around/above your head? Any self-respecting Wizard would have a solar system of orange ioun stones whirling around them.
The fact that they are "gloves" is mere fluff, as I pointed out above. If you would say "you can't wear 10 pairs of gloves, slotless or no" I would instead make 10 slotless gold chains of dexterity and walk around with a few pounds of gold hanging around my neck.
And how many gloves can you wear at the same time? You can wear one pair of ordinary (non-slotless) gloves on your hands. You can wear as many "slotless [x]'s" (where x is "gloves", "boots", "amulets", "headbands", "nose-flutes", "crotch-stuffers", "towels" or pretty much any thing else) as you like, limited only by your encumbrance. It appears slotless is made more so an item can be place anywhere to confer the bonus, like a set of prayer beads wrapped around a hand or a held holy symbol instead of it worn around the neck, not so you can fill one slot with 100 of them. "Slotless" means "does not occupy a slot". You can indeed wear a hundred or even a thousand slotless items. The exact "type" of a slotless item (whether it's a glove, boot, amulet, ring, nose-flute, etc.) is largely irrelevant fluff.
Tell me what gloves are slotless. "Slotless Gloves of [foo]". If you're allowing players to craft items, they can choose to craft items that do not occupy item slots.
Take a Level 20 Sorcerer: why is he no longer able to cast Level 1 spells after he has cast his six, despite still being able to cast forty eight more powerful spell? Actually, he can burn a higher-level spell slot in order to cast a lower-level spell. You don't need a special feat in order to do so - you just don't gain any benefit from using the higher-level slot.
that isn't even the kind of stacking I am referring to. So you would arbitrarily ban slotless items?
Something like a +2 Int gear for example, not hard at all. depending on what region they are in, I might not make them quest at all for the components. In other words, they can just spend a few months making slotless +2 Int headbands before they go off adventuring?
Its a bad idea to base magic items on a GP value. So you expect that magical items are going to be inherently "invaluable", with no way of determining if one is of greater worth than another? What about when someone wants to produce magic items? Do all your games just ban all "Craft X" feats? If they have a the level appropriate bonus already, why would they want to craft another item that does the same thing, if it isn't going to stack. They don't craft another item for themselves. Instead of sitting in their tower for years producing a huge warehouse of slotless gloves of dexterity, they actually go out and adventure for improvements. Or craft items for other people. Or any number of other actually productive things. Just as a question, roughly how difficult is it to get the required components for, say, slotless [item] of [attribute] +2? From what I can see, it's either: A. So difficult that a crafter has no hope of crafting level-appropriate items, or
Assuming that your gameworld is actually internally consistent, of course.
Do you not allow your players to craft their own magic items or something?
Is there a point to making it a higher caster level, or is that possible even? For spell-completion items such as wands and scrolls, there is a point to choosing to increase the caster level beyond the minimum (as that will affect the potency of the effect). For items such as weapons that do not have any CL-dependent effects, there is no benefit to upping the caster level.
Keep in mind that if the BBEG can fly high enough to be out of melee range, no tumble check would be necessary to move over the PCs.
That's not a penalty. A character with 20 strength gets exactly the same benefit from a +4 strength bow as one with 18 strength.This. There's no penalty for being stronger than your bow.Except for not getting your whole strength mod on damage. Compare a +4 Strength bow with any melee weapon. A 20 Strength character gets a lesser bonus with the bow than with the sword.
This. There's no penalty for being stronger than your bow. Except for not getting your whole strength mod on damage.
Instead of not releasing stuff in the year/6 months before an edition change, how about releasing "conversion errata" for everything released in that time period that details how to use it with the new edition? Gives you the full 10, 15 or however many years of support for the additional system, while not releasing soon-to-be-redundant stuff. This also has another quality of allowing the new edition to start out with a handful of supplements already made for it.
People who lead armies. How expensive would it be to equip your entire archery division with a +1 bow? Answer: A whole lot more than it would cost to give each of them 5 +1 arrows. Giving line troops a handful of magical arrows is far more cost-effective than giving every single one a magical bow. This also applies to smaller groups, too. For example, a bandit group might have a little under 50 +1 arrows between them.
Do casters somehow never use spells below their highest caster level? Suppose that, for the sake of argument, the Wizard prepares two of each - two fireballs, two lightning bolts. Against electricity-immune enemies, he has two completely useless spell slots. Compare with a Sorcerer who's chosen Lightning Bolt - instead of having useless spell slots, he can pump out four more Scorching Rays, with +1 metamagic on them if he has the required feat. No wasted spell slots. If the sorcerer is so blasted versatile, then why is the wizard at every level have more selection and more spells per day? Because the wizard has to pick and choose in advance. Memorize a lightning bolt, that's a spell slot that is completely wasted if you're up against elec-immune enemies. Sorcerer up against electric-immune enemies just casts other things instead of lightning bolts.
Sorcerer has on-the-fly versatility. Up against Fire Elementals? No problem, just toss out a few Lightning Bolts. If the Wizard prepped Fireballs, those are basically wasted slots.
From the PRD: Upon a roll of natural 20 (followed by a successful roll to confirm the critical hit)...
Honestly, most of the time (especially if you're not a fast-BAB class), stuff beyond the second iterative is only going to hit on a 20 anyway. You go for the +1 enhancement, and then stack on +damage (or alternatively, if you have autoconfirmed crits, things like Vorpal).
It's fairly straightforward to use two (or however many arms you have...) returning + heavily enhanced throwing weapons for your primary attacks, and ordinary, masterwork, or low-enhanced (depending on your wealth) ones for your later iteratives. Remember that unlike ammunition, thrown weapons do not break when you use them.
I think that there is a greater problem with thrown weapons. You can only carry so many of them, and even then, you look like a walking armory (at least at low levels). That's the thing with thrown weapons - they're not meant to be things you stand way back and biff at the enemy for the whole fight. They're more like what the melee fighter attacks with before he's closed to melee range. You're only going to throw one or two in the whole fight, and since (unlike ammunition) you can almost always recover thrown weapons afterwards (assuming you win), you don't need to carry dozens and dozens of axes.
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