Karys's page

I would love to see new options for Kineticist the same way as I would any other class, more options are neat to have. Can't say I think Kineticist specifically needs them, but would certainly love to see it.

To be honest I didn't need any convincing to get into SF2e as I already love Starfinder in general. I'm less likely to really combine the two games' options on the player side (unless they get sent to Numeria, then cowabunga it is), but am absolutely looking forward to taking creatures from either game and using them in the other as desired.

Agonarchy wrote:

Slide pistol is pretty close to a revolver already.

A double-action revolver wouldn't cost an extra action for a follow-up shot. So it could be 6 shots as fast as you like, and then 3 to 6 actions to reload.

Precisely what I was going for, still something of a hassle to reload during combat that a Gunslinger might have an edge on using. But useful for anyone proficient in it to get a few shots without needing to reload, spend actions to change barrels or be relegated to an air repeater.

I think it's high time someone in Alkenstar invent a proper revolver to solve these reload problems.

Edit: Ok, that was like half joking, but I just found out there were revolvers in Ultimate Equipment for first edition, what's the deal? Why can't we have those here? I might actually be kinda upset now cause those would be a big help lol.

Gorgo Primus wrote:

Animated Broom (pg.18) has its AC listed as “15 (13 when broken)”, but under its Construct Armor section it says it has AC 14 when broken.

I just got the PDFs and downloaded them from the humble bundle, so presumably they are the most up to date.

The PDF still has this issue, did we ever find out which it was post-broken, 13 or 14?

Page 18: Change animated broom’s construct armor ability to say “reducing its Armor Class to 13”, matching its AC entry.

Looks like that was corrected in the last fall errata pass. PDFs won't reflect errata changes until the physical book is due for a reprint, I believe. So going to the FAQ section for errata updates is the best place to check after picking up a book as they may not be incorporated into the PDF yet.

Perhaps a companion themed martial akin to the Hunter from PF1, focusing on teamwork with their companion, with more companion customization and options built in would be an idea to work with. Like a more martial take to what summoner is.

Because, again, RNG goes both ways. It was genuinely a gameplay problem that Belcorra could and did roll a 1 vs Slow, and get completely deleted as a threat.

Same thing happened to another single foe fight, one that the GM worried might TPK us. It makes for genuinely "bad gameplay" if and when fights are decided by a single bad roll. Everyone at the table knows it's b+!#$~&&, even when it's in our favor.

It damages the fun every time it happens.

I'll be completely honest in that I don't know what the goal of this thread is anymore, because it seems wildly off topic now more than ever. All I can say is if being downed by an errant crit or having a boss downed by an errant crit early in battle isn't fun, that's a problem for your table to solve in how they run encounters somehow, or by removing/modifying degrees of success. But this really has nothing to do with teaching the game anymore and is just complaining about unrelated parts of the system, so I'm checking out of this.

This arbitrary yardstick to measure "good" and "bad" design wildly changes shape and size depending on what table is looking at it, so it's meaningless. Your complaints are with GMs and writers making scenarios that take your agency away and can kill you outright. This is yet again NOT a system issue, because no duh throwing a full PL+4 boss at you is gonna end badly (or being ambushed at an inn while sleeping with a full room chain lightning, for that matter). But I got curious and went to read some of that AP's suggestions for using her ambushes, as I haven't touched that AP.

All in all, this is a collaborative game. If the players aren't doing their part playing the game as the table would like (i.e. being murderhobos, being disruptive, infighting, not being interactive, whatever) or the GM isn't being cooperative (antagonistic design that harms player fun, railroading, giving no chance for player survival) Then someone at the table is in fact making an error in these suggestions of "no error full to down = bad gameplay" because the only "objectively" bad gameplay is when the table isn't enjoying the game. Which sometimes could be not connecting with a system as written. It would be great if there was a system so perfect everyone could enjoy it exactly as it's written, but I find it doubtful such a thing exists, there's always going to be something in the designs of these things some players disagree with and that's why it's a collaborative effort to find a way to play it that the table enjoys.

You're not wrong for not enjoying what has happened in your games, however that's an issue to take up with the way your table handles adventures, I'm also not wrong for thinking those possible outcomes are good in my games with my own groups because it is good for us. And it all circles back to the whole point of this thread: "GMs and/or players could be taught better" to balance things out for their play experience, especially for the GMs who are the main arbiter of game difficulty.

Yes, a BBEG curb-stomping the party can be "cool" from a narrative PoV, but if it's still a "no misplay full-->down" event, that it still invokes the "... is bad gameplay" follower.

If your table doesn't want that as a possibility from the BBEG, then the GM should have had a discussion with the players about expectations long before arriving at the 3rd book of an AP (that they've presumably read and have seen the encounter, and should have an idea how it can play out). The GM is a player too and the error could come from them just as much as any PC's player. And similarly, pointing to an AP boss ambushing and harrying the party is not a system issue, if it's an issue it's a writer issue and take it up with them, not the system.

And yet again, just because you say it's bad gameplay doesn't make it objectively bad gameplay from a system level. People simply have different preferences.

That SoT ambush has been brought up numerous times, and while I have not run that volume yet, I plan to in the future so have read through all of the books a couple times over. The way your GM ran it is 100% different than how I read it, so I'm not exactly sure how much mileage you can get from that claim. And I've never really seen anyone say anything about the encounter in any forums while looking for others experiences with the AP, which I would expect to see if it was notoriously dropping players.

If anything it speaks to poor writing and leaving it too open ended to read it as being excessively deadly. Which is why I can only see most of the issues here as GM or adventure issues.

Can I ask, why are you opposed to reverse, where the baseline AP is written so that beginner GMs just feeding the encounters to beginner players will do fine, and Paizo includes extra guidance for advanced players and GMs on how to upscale it?

I mean, we're talking about levels 1-3 or levels 1-5 here. It makes little sense to me to tune that for advanced players and GM and then include guidance for beginners on how to make it easier. Writing a series of encounters that require a high level of system mastery to GM and for PCs to survive through, but then adding text telling beginner GMs all the modifications they will need to do to make it suitable for beginner players, is pretty much the poster child for the thread title "not doing a good job of teaching new players how to play."

As far as I'm aware APs aren't designed for beginners or experts as a whole, they're just prewritten adventures to save time. And you're putting an argument out that I never made so I'm genuinely not sure what you're talking about. My suggestion of guidance is for in a book like the GM core, not APs. I'm suggesting that paizo should have done a better job having the GM core teach. Literally what this thread is about.

Karys wrote:

At this stage I get the feeling most of the issues in this thread are a blend of GM and adventure writer issues rather than a system level issue. So the most reasonable takeaway for me is there should be a small amount of extra guidance in the encounter guidelines for lower levels and/or new players.

I'd like to see the system allow for newbie groups and GMs to run APs "as written" with low chance of dying at early levels. There are multiple different ways to fix this - some system ways, some AP ways - but I think putting it on GMs to ensure it doesn't happen is the wrong fix, because GMs should be assumed to be on a learning curve too. That's like saying an encounter will is easy as long as the players simply remember this special specific rule on p39 of the third supplement to the umpty ump book; sure, that could work. But it's really a fix intended to serve the advanced player community, not the new player community.

APs are written by various people who are all humans and will build their encounters differently or even make mistakes. I'm saying that they *should* have included extra guidance for low level or new players including GMs. So what are you talking about on that last part?

At this stage I get the feeling most of the issues in this thread are a blend of GM and adventure writer issues rather than a system level issue. So the most reasonable takeaway for me is there should be a small amount of extra guidance in the encounter guidelines for lower levels and/or new players.

Karys wrote:

This is the "better game" to me, so I'm sorry for having the wrong fun, I guess?...

Again, with all due respect and without being mean, yeah you're kinda wrong.

There Is One such things as personal preferences (which are sacred and i cannot argue againts them) and game design (which can be treated as an academic subject), and here we are talking about game design, not personal preferences.

Like, i know this metaphor might sound stupid but It's the best i can come up with: i'd rather read furry smut all day long than reading the kharamazovs Brothers, and those are my personal preferences, but i would never, in a discussion that tries to be objective as much as a discussion can be, Say that an ao3 monster hunter world's smut fic Is Better than One of the greatest novels to ever be written

Yes, that's why I said "to me," felt I made it abundantly clear that it's my opinion and preference. The game design is fine to me based on my preferences, so to me it is good game design, but I don't expect it to fit everyone's preferences. So what is your point?

Karys wrote:

Personally I agree with Deriven on this, there's no real issue with these numbers. It makes the early levels "more deadly" because honestly, why wouldn't they be? You're new to adventuring, or at the very least out of practice and likely to take a beating in all out combat.

And these HP numbers are perfectly in line with leveling up in video games I've played when you take into account characters in most RPG video games grow from level 1 to 99 or so while PF2 characters only go to 20, so the growth has to be spread differently. The games I'm familiar with also function on a similar philosophy that you will likely die if you make a mistake or bad decisions, or simply have a bad dice roll particularly at low level. These types of games exist, and they're not wrong for existing with that as a baseline, but much like PF2 they have an easy mode option that weakens the enemies and strengthens the party if anyone isn't skilled enough to complete...

The thing about video games is you can typically reload your save. With a tabletop, the default is permadeath until you have access to in-game resurrection.

The punishments are on an entirely different scale of inconvenience and frustration. Very few games are designed such that a character death is permanent for a "playthrough" that could last hundreds of hours, but that is the default for a game like PF2E. This combination of playthrough length and permanence is basically unseen in video games, because it's considered bad design in that space. It's so unusual that games that buck the convention are usually either roguelikes (which often have short playthrough lengths anyways) or take on metafictional qualities just in virtue of bucking the convention and calling attention to it.

An unfair or difficult level 1 is fundamentally different when there's a "retry" button.

I very much know the difference between the mediums, I was using the comparison to explain my personal preferences and opinion that lead me to my view on this, and because the comment about FF13's character growth made me think about comparing the numbers to some games I've played with similar lethality. I just wanted to state my view on the matter, so the permadeath thing doesn't really change my opinion whatsoever because I'm into that feeling.

To be clear, I'm not *against* something like say PF3e moving the lethality needle in a way that suits the majority judging by this thread, I simply also just don't see the need on a personal level.

This kind of reasoning Is, and i don't mean to sound unkind, genuinely the reason the ttrpgs space hasn't evolved much in all these years: you're applying narrative "common sense" reason while we should all apply ludo-narrative academic reason in such situations.

The main purpouse of EVERY SINGLE GAME EVER Is to be fun, not to be realistic, not to be accurate, but fun, this Is the reason there's not a secret roll to see if you're gonna die from a stroke all of a sudden, It's the reason that shooters gun don't work like in real Life.

If we Want to create Better games we should completely ignore common sense and focus on academic game design

This is the "better game" to me, so I'm sorry for having the wrong fun, I guess?

Deriven Firelion wrote:

And I don't know what you want. Less damage from the monsters? Fourty hit points at first level so you never have to worry about getting crushed?

Example HP gain on that example Alch level up:

L1 --> L2: 15 -- +9 --> 24 | + 37.5% max HP

L4 --> L5: 46 -- +10 --> 56 | + 21.7% max HP

L9 --> L10: 105 -- +11 --> 116 | + 10.4% max HP

L14 --> L15: 174 --> +12 --> 186 | + 6.9% max HP

This math is stupid.
In almost all games where characters gain HP via leveling, they start with a substantial base pool, and have rather small [% total] gains, especially during the early levels (which can even have artificially limited leveling/stat growth for the sake of tutorialization & fun; think of skill/stat trees like FF13's crystarium that cap and unlock via story progression).

Pf2 not only has the starting HP pool be way too tiny, but it also has the % total gain stay crazy high for quite a number of levels before the single levelup gains start to become more reasonable with the growing total.

Personally I agree with Deriven on this, there's no real issue with these numbers. It makes the early levels "more deadly" because honestly, why wouldn't they be? You're new to adventuring, or at the very least out of practice and likely to take a beating in all out combat.

And these HP numbers are perfectly in line with leveling up in video games I've played when you take into account characters in most RPG video games grow from level 1 to 99 or so while PF2 characters only go to 20, so the growth has to be spread differently. The games I'm familiar with also function on a similar philosophy that you will likely die if you make a mistake or bad decisions, or simply have a bad dice roll particularly at low level. These types of games exist, and they're not wrong for existing with that as a baseline, but much like PF2 they have an easy mode option that weakens the enemies and strengthens the party if anyone isn't skilled enough to complete the game on the normal difficulty. a GM is the arbiter of this difficulty setting, and when it's realized the players are not ok with that level of deadliness, it gets tweaked.

On the actual topic of the system teaching you, I look back to my experiences in the video game RPGs I've grown up playing. Simply put, my favorite ones didn't do any teaching, I was thrown in, picked a party of various classes and came out with dead party members, game overs, and experience. But I understand this being a collaborative game needs more nuance in learning, so I agree there could be better guidance on expectations and especially on what enemy level compositions are more viable for lower level PCs to handle for a slightly lower stakes adventure.

So they altered the text to correct that. And now it functions the way everyone wanted it to function.

Not a single word of Blessed Armament was changed in the errata, meaning it always functioned the way everyone wanted it to. Assuming they changed a feature to be a dead option feels like an extremely bad faith reading in the first place.

Spamotron wrote:

Movie Smaug is explicitly a bad example for your argument. Because it wasn't arbitrary. There's plenty of interviews explaining that his initial design was based on the original four legged artwork but they couldn't get the model skeleton to move naturally and he came across as a blatantly artificical. The "wyvern," redesign was as much a practical decision based on technical limitations as anything else. Given that Smaug is what a lot of people consider to be the best thing about those movies. Often citing how impressively he moves. It was almost certainly the right choice to change him.

Well guess we should make vampires into glittering vegetarian xmen then after all so many teenager girls loved it.

I agree. Mythological creatures can and should be adapted into a multitude of different concepts and there's nothing wrong with that. I don't even care for the glittering vampires but I'll defend to death that it's fine to make a vampire concept like that because who cares. Dragons are the same, make them whatever way seems cool for what you're doing.

So this is a playstyle that PF2 wants to enable, it's just not something you can do an infinite number of times since your shield can only take so many hits.

I should have made myself more clear, because this is correct and the last part what I meant mostly so I appreciate it. There's nothing wrong with aiming to protect and take hits for your allies, especially with Shield of Reckoning, I was trying to refer more the idea that seems to be trying to take nearly every hit as often as they can and expecting to shield block the maximum amount of times every round. Which works great for my Paladin in Final Fantasy strapped with the Aegis shield, less ideal with finite shield resources to manage.

Fabios wrote:

On most level, a fella here did the calculations above, shields break with four non-crit hits. Four shield blocks, for a Quick shield block champion that's ideally two turns

'Ideally'? You're a champion with your shield raised, what the heck are you fighting that even if everything is attacking you you're consistently getting hit twice per turn by on-level attacks? And are you never using your other reaction for, like, your Champion reaction? You also have Lay on Hands and a good HP pool, you can facetank and heal damage if your shield is close to breaking. And if you took some of the specialty shields, their abilities could have saved you from getting hit.

Note they also want to be using effects like Shield Warden or Shield of Reckoning to also be shield blocking for their allies, contributing to all of these blocks per turn. It feels like they want to be playing as a tank in an MMO intervening for any attacks against the party, which is frankly an excessive expectation if so.

Karys wrote:

Fabios wrote:

Because It doesn't really do that, since It gives you ONLY the rune appropriate for the level your shield won't have the maxed out stats. You Need lower level runes anyway (this Is how It's written, i Hope i'm wrong)

I'm not perfectly fluent in all the rules, so someone can correct me if I'm wrong, but reinforcing runes are fundamental runes and those simply get replaced/upgraded as they increase, you don't put previous runes on. Unless reinforcing runes are different in some way that I'm unaware of.

That Is, i think, the problem. You're still required to buy shield because the rune on its own doesn't get you a shield as strong as a sturdy One (aka, the bare minimum).

One Major point of this ability Is to save cash, and It fails in that too lol.

I'm becoming increasingly confused. It saves you the entire amount you'd spend on a rune for your shield, which i believe tops out at 32k GP at 19th level. Which lets you use that on any other equipment or even, as mentioned, a second shield to add more longevity to blocking by having a backup. And a sturdy shield isn't bare minimum, it's just the highest amount of blocking power, the runes bridge the gap for other shields with unique effects to still be useful while not making the sturdy shield obsolete.

Because It doesn't really do that, since It gives you ONLY the rune appropriate for the level your shield won't have the maxed out stats. You Need lower level runes anyway (this Is how It's written, i Hope i'm wrong)

I'm not perfectly fluent in all the rules, so someone can correct me if I'm wrong, but reinforcing runes are fundamental runes and those simply get replaced/upgraded as they increase, you don't put previous runes on. Unless reinforcing runes are different in some way that I'm unaware of.

Tactical Drongo wrote:

[

while I have also mixed feelings towards the new shield ally, this looks a loot like whiteroom mathematics
I doubt that even half the players get the chance for two shieldblocks per turn
and the extra hardness, while not much, still is useful, pathfinder is famour for a single point making a difference
also you seem to assume that every player blocks every strike at the maximum damage, while there are players out there who pace their shield blocks for critical moments and against strikes that do little to no damage against the shield

then again, with your last answer it feels also like your opinion is set in stone and you are going to ignore most, if not all, of the arguments presented here

-"oh but you'll have more shields to choose from" problem Is most shields are terrible, spellbound Is decent only for a while and then requires me to spend on reinforcing runes to keep It up since shield blessing only gives the appropriate level runes, which doesn't max out my shield, same thing for fortress and clockwork.

I'm somewhat confused by this statement, why would you need to spend on runes when it's already giving you runes of the appropriate level? Unless you mean to get the +1 Hardness bonus for already having the highest rune?

Being able to prepare two whole staves and get the charges for both combined seems kinda broken in a bad way. Definitely feels like an error that was fixed, not a nerf.

I'd disagree that there Is any fundamental difference in concept inbetween a mmo tank and a ttrpg tank.

A tank has to do Two things:
-take aggro
-being able to resist damage After taking up aggro.

How would you define a tank otherwise? Cause every glass cannon can take aggro quite easily

An MMO tank takes aggro because you're fighting AI enemies that follow programming about who to attack, that doesn't work in a TTRPG so they're inherently very different. Any GM might run creatures very differently to another GM in how they react to seeing a heavily armored Champion, a Barb lugging around a sword twice their size, and a Wizard throwing fireballs at them.

So the Champion went the most likely route to being a "tank" for a TTRPG, and can actively mitigate and prevent damage for the party, potentially drawing attention to themselves who can endure the hits but aren't necessarily taking them all.

I was dealing with a rough time in my life, so a friend suggested trying PF1 as a distraction of sorts. Hardly got to play but was enthralled by the books and world, Golarion is a crazy place and I couldn't say no to learning more.

Not long after that Starfinder and PF2e were happening, and kept me hooked ever since with the world updates and especially the three actions and feat systems of PF2e.

Hearing that Starfinder 2e existing is giving Numeria material a chance of happening is more than enough to keep me happy and hoping, even if it doesn't come to fruition!

Either something is wrong on my end or something I said was a step too far and my previous post was sent to the Boneyard.

But I'll just reiterate that the books I would die for are anything about Numeria or a Lost Omens book covering current events in the solar system.

Neat! I'll have to see about giving those a read sometime, wouldn't mind seeing how the writing about the gods and planes have changed in all those years. Thank you!

So... when looking at earlier posts, someone mentioned the idea that Pharasma feeds Groetus the souls of atheists in order to stave off the apocalypse?

Where did they get that idea from???

To be honest I've been trying to figure this out myself, but google is useless and all I've found mentioning it are dodgy fandom wikis and forum posts that seem equally unsure of themselves. So I'm curious of the source for that info as well because it would be an interesting read.

Castilliano wrote:

Holy crap, you are still refusing to engage with the actual issue and willfully misinterpreting my posts to blow a lot of smoke on irrelevant details.

Atheists are a real world religious group.

Quote:

Swap Rahadoum being atheist for jewish, and have the Pure Legion enforce Judaism only. With jews hunting and killing clerics of other religions to enforce jewish purity.

This would be seen as a 5-alarm-lore-fire in need of immediate changing.

Yes it would, thankfully that's not happening in the lore. I'm an atheist myself, and the idea that you can't use the concept of atheism for an evil in a fictional world is nonsense. Atheism is the term for disbelief of gods and is the simplest choice to use here for Rahadoum even if somewhat incorrect. Using Judaism would be a reference to a specific religion, atheism is a word for a concept, the disbelief of god.

But if its such a sticking point for you, send Paizo your feedback to change the term to something else like Misotheism I guess.

Sadly it seems like that page is missing when looking at Nethys. Either that or it is just terribly well hidden.

I admittedly hadn't thought about looking at AoN, and you're right, it's decidedly absent from AoN's catalyst trait listing from HotW. Might be worth sending as feedback to them, as it can definitely cause confusion like this.

Activating a catalyst

is part of Casting the Spell. The catalyst might increase
the number of actions required to Cast the Spell, as
indicated in the catalyst’s Activate entry. Additionally,
the spell gains the manipulate trait if it didn’t already.
Because the catalyst becomes part of the spell, you can
draw the catalyst as part of Casting the Spell.

Checked my copy of HotW and while it doesn't mention components anymore, it still mentions the free draw when casting.

When I first got to read this playtest, my initial response was "They nailed Necromancer perfectly," so ymmv on this idea that this doesn't fulfill the necromancer class fantasy.

Scarablob wrote:

Yeah, I never really understood why in DnD gnome were a "core race"

D&D 4e agreed with you and dropped gnome from the core lineup.

I'm starting to understand why 4e was so unpopular. /j

While it's not specifically called out on the rituals section, the book mentions and encourages removing mythic point requirements for mythic destiny archetypes you want to use in non-mythic games. So I believe it's entirely fair to bring up that the GMs can hand wave requirements, though it would be nice to have included guidance like reducing mythic proficiency requirement to legendary, remove mythic point requirement etc.

And to be clear on my stance I think the change is entirely unnecessary but largely inconsequential in the long run due to how infrequently rituals seem to be used as far as I've seen.

I'm very confused by this thread, no offense meant to anyone involved. I think the ranged meta has nothing to do with "best options," it just means that it's common to see people with ranged attacks that are effective compared to PF2. It's just a statement from Paizo to take into account that ranged attacks are readily, and likely to be, used by everyone.

That's my read of it at least, just seems like more is being read into it than there actually is.

Probably needs to use something like a Weapon Attack DC (not currently a thing but would be easy to use).

I agree with this, make a DC using your attack roll with the weapon, and give Soldier a feature that lets them use CON instead of DEX for area attack DCs, or something similar to that.

While I stand by compatibility being a good thing and I'm glad the core rules will hold up both games, I do wish we could have the skills converted over to being in line with Starfinder's setting even if it could cause minor hiccups for the GM to adjudicate when converting between games.

Things like Crafting and Thievery being combined to Engineering, to cover disabling machinery, creating items and the like, and it would bring the total skills more in line with what the system expects. Though I won't complain either way it comes out, but I wouldn't be upset dealing with the minor headache of those conversions.

I feel the rules are fine as they are right now, but agree there should be feats/archetype of some variety to facilitate using multi-armed characters further.

Your party certainly weren't loafing around when coming up with a plan for this guy.

The Deck of Many Things was absolutely printed for 2e. But to answer the question, technically yes, but the deck will probably find a way to ruin your day first with bad draws like Perpdepog said.

I would lean towards preparing a makeshift staff not granting charges outside of expending a spell slot, same as it did in pre-remaster. If it worked the same as a regular staff in remaster, it wouldn't have to clarify that after it's crafted into a normal staff it gains charges from preparation.

SuperParkourio wrote:

All shields must now be strapped to your arm and held in one hand.

Do you have a rules citation?

All shields, unless specifically noted or described otherwise, must be strapped to your arm and held in one hand, so you can’t hold anything with that hand and Raise a Shield, and you lose the shield’s benefits if that hand is no longer free.

Create Water creates 2 gallons of water and evaporates after a day, very specific in how it functions, so I have no idea what you're asking me. It just creates water. Nothing in my argument implies I think the water should disappear. This has nothing to do with the discussion at hand and like Protector Tree makes no sense.

I've stated my opinion on Puff of Poison, to me the entry is clear in how it functions as it is not an inhaled alchemical poison as well as the spell being very specific in function, it affects only the target. The discussion feels as if it's going on circles now so I'm taking my leave.

...

I'm not understanding the comparison to Protector Tree, Protector Tree is very explicit in what it can block, so that makes no sense. Where Puff of Poison is specific about exactly what it affects, 1 target. The name and description of the spell are more than enough to clarify, it's a puff, a small cloud directly into someone's face.

Karys wrote:

In my eyes Puff of Poison as well as Pepper Powder are pretty clear in their intention, they affect one target instantaneously upon use and that's the extent of their effect. I would rule neither cause a lingering cloud as neither are poisons and wouldn't follow the inhaled poison rules.

Ideally, they could simply leave off the Inhaled trait from both of these effects to avoid these readings, but the spell and item are pretty explicit in how they specifically function to me.

That is the entire function of the trait. The only time the existence of the cloud is mentioned in any of the inhaled items is when it's behavior is modified. For Yellow Musk, that's for the victim to be fascinated by the cloud.

-------------------

If the trait was there to signal airborne hazards, it would be used all over the place. There is no reason to have the trait if it's a hit one target and done kind of deal.

You cannot say "I don't like that it has the trait & it's functionality, so I'm going to ignore it."

Specific trumps general in this case, the Puff of Poison spell and Pepper Powder are very explicit about how they target and who makes a check: the target. They require the target to inhale the spell or item to affect it. It is exactly what it says on the tin.

I'm personally inclined to believe the writers of these entries likely added the trait erroneously to show an airborne hazard, but haven't had any errata pass catch or correct it. Since you are correct that they are strange outliers which makes me assume they are in fact errors. But in any case, they're specific enough to override the general rule either way.

In my eyes Puff of Poison as well as Pepper Powder are pretty clear in their intention, they affect one target instantaneously upon use and that's the extent of their effect. I would rule neither cause a lingering cloud as neither are poisons and wouldn't follow the inhaled poison rules.

Ideally, they could simply leave off the Inhaled trait from both of these effects to avoid these readings, but the spell and item are pretty explicit in how they specifically function to me.

Wounded is a condition that treats your dying as though it is higher than it would be without it. Like doomed is a condition that treats your death threshold as lower than the default generally 4.

They have a value that tells us the amount it modifies by. We wouldn't treat that value like damage. We would treat it like a condition with a value. Those go by the highest value. Yes the recovery section has a note on failure in parens but its no different from the reminder in the taking damage section which was there pre remaster and not seen as applying the condition effect in a stacking manner.

Even pre remaster you weren't supposed to increase your dying more than 1 for normal damage or 2 for crit damage. That hasn't changed in the remaster.
This is also something you can see in the entry for the dying condition itself.

There's no problem of stacking as the Wounded condition applies to instances of gaining Dying, it's not a flat modifier to your Dying value. Otherwise you could never effectively reach Dying 0 and stabilize without outside assistance, unless I'm misunderstanding what you're suggesting.

In the remaster is every class at least trained in a class DC?

Sure are! Noticed weapon critical specializations use class DCs now in fact. For example, being hit by a hammer crit gives a fort save against class DC to not be knocked prone.