Karcinal Eschatar's page

Genetics isn't the only factor of sorcery. It merely produces brains optimized for spellcasting. This is why the Sage and Empyreal bloodlines can operate on Intelligence and Wisdom instead of Charisma. But once a brain has the connections in place to cast spells, those connections carry over to the new brain. This shape-of-sorcery then insinuates itself upon the blood passing through the brain, and the magical aspect of the bloodline is reverse-engineered (because bloodlines can arise merely from exposure to a magical source).

Of course, that's just my take on it. If your GM is the type to revoke your bloodline over this, you can at least argue that the spells your character KNOWS are separate from the bloodline spells your character inherited. Maybe you can argue for the mongrel mage archetype.

The tome of dissolution seems like the perfect spellbook for a shadowcaster to have thematically, except you can't prepare your shadow spells in darkness. It's annoying to need an extra traveling spellbook for up to 9 other spells when the point of the tome of dissolution is to not haul a library around with you.

As far as pragmatism goes, the tome makes more sense (there is no way the GM is going to give you so many spells by level 12 that you need to spend more than 10000 gp to transcribe them). And if you're a shadowcaster, maybe your GM will let you commission a bookmark of deception to disguise the tome as a cheaper spellbook so your shadow can prepare spells from it as well.

Karcinal Eschatar wrote:

Chess Pwn wrote:

each has it's own and no, the exploit isn't enough to power the other exploit to being full level, though if you take the arcanist archetype that does actually give them a bloodline then it works.

So the prohibition on a Blood Arcanist selecting Bloodline Development can be bypassed by selecting it as an Exploiter first?

What are you asking?

What I said was that if you take the Blood Arcanist archetype or the School Savant archetype that give you a full bloodline or arcane school respectively that those can meet the conditions for the exploiter to combine the levels with the bloodline development exploit.

If you are an exploiter wizard 5 and a normal arcanist 5 and pick up bloodline development then you'll have 2 copies of the bloodline and can pump a point to treat your level as lv5 for the 1st level power.

Thanks for the clarification. My mind's always looking for loopholes, probably why this archetype calls out to me. Either that, or I'm just paranoid that the GM is going to tempt me with a Faustian contract or a Jackass genie.

Would my exploiter wizard be able to upgrade his bonded mask? Would he be able to select that Arcane Discovery at all? Thanks for any input.

each has it's own and no, the exploit isn't enough to power the other exploit to being full level, though if you take the arcanist archetype that does actually give them a bloodline then it works.

So the prohibition on a Blood Arcanist selecting Bloodline Development can be bypassed by selecting it as an Exploiter first?

How would exploits work for a multiclassed Arcanist/Exploiter? The RAW for Bloodline Development and School Understanding state that arcanist levels stack with levels from another class that grants a bloodline or arcane school. An Exploiter Wizard has no arcane school class feature by default, but can gain one through School Understanding.

Is each class being individually supplied its own class feature by the same exploit? Would School Understanding then fulfill its own criterion for granting full access to the selected school?

Would taking Swift Consume confer the consume spells feature?

Karcinal Eschatar wrote:

Uh oh...

Cast Paragon Surge. Choose Additional Traits. Choose Rich Parents.

Would you or a paid merchant lose the 900 gold once the spell wore off? Would the stuff you purchased disappear?

Two problems:

1) Rich Parents is not a legal trait for PFS (in case you weren't aware, you are in the PFS boards).

2) Rich Parent's only affects your gold at character creation, at any point after that it does nothing.

My bad. I've been double-checking on Nethys Archives for the little PFS logo on traits. The trait was wedged between two PFS legal traits. Guess my dyslexia strikes again.

Uh oh...

Cast Paragon Surge. Choose Additional Traits. Choose Rich Parents.

Would you or a paid merchant lose the 900 gold once the spell wore off? Would the stuff you purchased disappear?

This is why none of the elven pantheon favors the elven curve blade.

Also, would a cleric of Nethys be able to use a katana double walking stick as a favored weapon?

Would a half-orc qualify for the Racial Heritage feat, and by extension Paragon Surge?

This is a very nuanced topic. I'd reason that it depended upon which deities were involved, how many were involved, the nature of the recipient of the bonus and the spellcasters, and the deities' attitudes toward one another. Morality is subjective for many deities, so the interaction between sacred and profane bonuses should also be subjective. Still, here are a few examples of how I think it would play out.

Stack: Worshipers of the same CN deity with opposed alignments; worshipers of the same LN deity with like alignments.

Overlap: Worshipers of the same CN or LN deity with differing yet unopposed alignments; worshipers of the same N deity with opposed alignments.

Cancel Out: Diametrically opposed nonneutral deities (Iomedae vs. Lamashtu); worshipers of N deities whose alignments are within one step of the other; diametrically opposed worshipers of the same LN deity who are forced to work together; worshipers of the same CN deity who share the same alignment; deities who are on bitter terms regardless of their alignments (Pharasma vs. Urgothoa).

Would an oracle be restricted to deity-specific spells of just one deity, or would he have the opportunity to learn a spell specific to any deity tied to his mystery? For example, could a Life oracle learn Early Judgement and Gozreh's Trident? If not, how would this affect an oracle that switched deities?

With the current system, it would be wise to not allow preparing spells from scrolls.

An arcanist can prepare any spell that a wizard can, but can then cast it like a sorcerer without expending it. This means an arcanist can't fail at copying a spell from a scroll to a spellbook.

The fact that spells on scrolls always take up a foot of scroll length also distinguishes their nature from spells in spellbooks, which require a minimum of one page per spell level.

IMHO, sorcerers should make a choice upon learning the spell, dependent upon his bloodline. The sorcerer would get to choose whether the protection is from the bloodline's associated alignment, or against the associated alignment's opposition. If there is more than one associated alignment component, he may choose which type of alignment component when he casts the spell.

For example, if a sorcerer has the Abyssal bloodline, then upon learning the spell he should choose whether he's protecting chaotic and/or evil creatures or protecting against them. If he chooses against, then he learns both Protection from Evil and Protection from Chaos. If he chooses to protect CE creatures, then he would learn both Protection from Good and Protection from Law. Alternatively, his alignment at the time of learning the spell could determine the protection, with TN, LE and CG still allowing him to make choice when he learns it. At GM's discretion, an alignment shift could change the options.

Clerics and paladins should logically be limited in protection options by their deity's alignment, but gain a choice when casting if the deity has two alignment components. Since oracles gain their spells from an entire pantheon, they should only be prohibited from casting protection against their own alignment components. True neutral deities would allow for any alignment protection.

Finally, since wizards and witches must prepare ahead of time, they should choose the alignment when preparing the spell, but not be limited by their own alignment.

Granted, this makes the rules way too complicated for a single spell for the sake of realism. It may be better to just make a spellcaster choose and alignment upon learning the spell. Perhaps a multiple choice version of the spell could be made as a second-level spell?