Khuldar's page

I'm looking for suggestions on a position for a crewmember on a sailing ship, who in fact, does not have any interest in sailing, ships, or the sea. And he does not have any skills useful for operating such a ship. No navigation, no piloting, no artillery magical or otherwise, no sleeping with other crewmembers, nada. The only thing this person would help with is fighting off boarding parties or sea monsters.

The reason I ask is because if the rest of the party decides to become sailors, I will go along with it instead of sitting on my butt doing nothing.

Don't knock being there to kill stuff. RL sailing ships thought it was important enough to carry marines and such, and they didn't have oceans full of kracken, aboliths, skum, and all the other "aquatic encounters" found in the bestiary.

People might gripe that you aren't pulling your weight, but the first time some -thing- from the deep pulls itself over the rail, and you put an axe in its misshapen skull, they'll change their tune.

Like how a Sling or a Bow gives its ammunition its enhancement bonus.

Potions (oils) of greater magic weapon and flame arrow will work. A bit pricey for day-to-day use, but might be worth it right before the showdown with the BBEG.

Custom gloves that do this sort of thing pop up a lot, but I don't think there are any in the published core rules.

An alchemist PC in my game would like to make something akin to a healing belt... but I can't stand the flavor of said item.

How much would this item cost:

The Decanter of Remidial Solution
-effect creates up to 3 cure moderate potions a day (2d8+4)

Requires Brew potion and Create Wonderous Item.

Cost:
Spell level (2 for an Alchemist) x Caster level (4 for an Alc) x 2000gp x 3/5 (for uses per day) ....

9600gp to buy
4800gp to make

Seems a little high in my opinion but maybe not, did I mess up the calculation?

One thing to keep in mind is that healing belts were massively undercoated for what they did. You might be fine using the 1,800 multiplier for command use activated rather then the 2,000 for continuous.

A CL4 potion of CMW is 400gp. Drinking 24 times from this decanter is your break even point. While the price per point of healing is higher then a wand of CLW, anyone can use it, and it has a better in combat use if needed. The price looks good to me overall.

How long does a spell component last before it needs to be replaced or refilled?

It's good forever. Keeping it full and up to date is one of those things that happens in the background when you aren't looking. Assume that you are harvesting bits, collecting rare things, swapping them with other casters, etc. Some GMs keep closer track, or highlight specific bits that need to be tracked (dragon scales in a game I'm in) but the core rules don't require that level of detail.

Skill focus:perception, a high INT, and copious notes as a player. We always use an INT check for remembering stuff (not sure if that is a core rule, or just a house one) Tell your GM that you are looking around all the time, and keep notes on what he tells you. Have a perception high enough not to miss any clues, and take notes so YOU don't forget them when they become relevant. Some GMs will remind you of things your character knows, others don't. That's when notes become important.

The rule in the Core Rulebook is "wizards get all cantrips," which means that every new book with cantrips means wizards start with even more spells, and there are some here at Paizo who are uncomfortable with that. However, I personally see that as no different than a book with yet another 1st cleric or druid spell that all clerics miraculously gain access too as soon as the book is available, and cantrips are of such minor power that giving a caster extra options really isn't a big deal.

Any thoughts on how to curb the power of divine casters knowing everything? In my group we either have very firm rules on what books are allowed in a campaign, or trade core spells out for new ones. Pathfinder doesn't have the years of bloat and splatbooks that 3.5 did, but as more books get published we could get into the same situation. Wizards at least have to find the spell before they copy it into their spell book, or use one of their 2/level free spells. Clerics and druids just know everything.

Greetings,

A 'simple' debate has popped up in two of my groups and I am unsure of the answer so we decided to ask the community. Hopefully you all know.

The question is twofold:
1: A potion of cure light wounds, how much does it heal?
2: A wand of cure light wounds, how much does that heal?

Some players say it is the minimum caster level when it comes to the bonus hp. Thus less for a potion then a wand. Others say that doesn't count at all.

I find some evidence to support either theory.

Does anyone know? And if so is able to give me a source?

When a magic item is created, it is made with a set caster level. The default is the minimum level, but you get what you pay for. Stock potion and wands of CLW are both 1d8+1, as the minimum CL for casting cure light is 1. While you need to be a 3rd or 5th level caster to take the item creation feats, unless you pay the higher cost, all you get is the 1st level effect.

Potions are 50x spell level x caster level
Wands are 750x spell level x caster level.

The minimum caster level is what is required to cast the spell, not qualify for the feat. It prevents you from making potions of cure moderate at CL 1.

Someone mentioned this item to me but wasn't sure which book it was in. Basically, it was described as a backpack with a built in bandoleer so you can have items more readily avaialble. The closest thing I can find is a Masterwork Backpack in the CRB, which doesn't quite sound the same. The person who told me about it thought it was in one of the GM guides which they didn't have with them.

Does this sound familiar to anyone? If so, will you tell the actual name and cost of it?

While there might be a mundane one hiding in some book somewhere, what every well-equiped adventurer is packing this days is the classic Haversack, found right in the core rules:

Handy Haversack
Aura moderate conjuration; CL 9th
Slot —; Price 2,000 gp; Weight 5 lbs.
DESCRIPTION
A backpack of this sort appears to be well made, well used, and quite ordinary. It is constructed of finely tanned leather, and the straps have brass hardware and buckles. It has two side pouches, each of which appears large enough to hold about a quart of material. In fact, each is like a bag of holding and can actually hold material of as much as 2 cubic feet in volume or 20 pounds in weight. The large central portion of the pack can contain up to 8 cubic feet or 80 pounds of material. Even when so filled, the backpack always weighs only 5 pounds.

While such storage is useful enough, the pack has an even greater power. When the wearer reaches into it for a specific item, that item is always on top. Thus, no digging around and fumbling is ever necessary to find what a haversack contains. Retrieving any specific item from a haversack is a move action, but it does not provoke the attacks of opportunity that retrieving a stored item usually does.

CONSTRUCTION
Requirements Craft Wondrous Item, secret chest; Cost 1,000 gp

Guys I'm sorry but I figure if I don't ask I won't learn. What am I doing wrong with my calculations for the staff of hoarding? I'm getting this:

- Legend lore: (400*6*11)/3 = 8,800
* Materials: 250*50 = 12,500
* Focus: = 200
- Secret chest: (300*5*11)/2 = 8,250
* Focus: 5,050
- Locate object: 200*2*11 = 4,400
- Identify: 200*1*11 = 2,200
- Magic aura: 200*1*11 = 2,200

TOTAL: 43,600 gp

The creator must have prepared the spells to be stored (or must know the spells, in the case of a sorcerer or bard) and must provide any focus the spells require as well as material component costs sufficient to activate the spell 50 times (divide this amount by the number of charges one use of the spell expends). Material components are consumed when he begins working, but focuses are not. (A focus used in creating a staff can be reused.)

Bolding mine. So you don't need to pay for the Foci (although with Secret Chest that seems wrong) and the cost for the materials is divided by the number of charges used. So you pay a lot less for Legend Lore's materials.

Most of the time we've seen leadership at my table, it was used for off-screen stuff. The noble might take it for a loyal seneschal, or the spy master might take it for his information network. But all the extras never went on adventures. They kept the home fires burning, secured the home front, or worked quietly in the shadows. The only exception I can think of in my years of playing was when we had a fop noble with a warforged bodyguard. It made for a very summoner/eidalon flavor, where the PC was irrelevant in combat compared to his cohort. It might be the fact that my group is on the large side (6-9 players), so we don't feel the need for extras.

If you look at Leadership as giving you a large number of basically normal, non-combatants, it suddenly becomes nicely balanced.

Balanced?

Pickelhaube (Helmet Spike)
+10gp, +5 lb., Exotic two-handed melee piercing weapon, 1d8, 20/x3
Added to armor, treated as being wielded with two hands even though it requires no hands to use.

If not, what would you change?

Armor Spikes are +50gp, +10lb 1d6 20/x2 light martial weapon. If you wanted to have better armor spikes, used as a primary attack, rather then the secondary attack they are now, you could bump them to a one handed (rather then light) weapon. This get get you to the 1d8 damage you have. Bumping it up to exotic justifies the increase to crit range. So mechanically, I have no problem with it, although would bump the price and weight up. 150gp and 15lbs for Exotic, heavy spiked armor with a 1d8 20/x3.

Thematically putting those stats on a spiked helmet seems excessive. I'd add something like "only when charging or being grappled" on it. Or having the x3 crit being only when charging, x2 otherwise. You could also switch the flavor from "helmet spike" to one of those horned, fantasy helmets that would make a minotaur feel inadequate. For a hands-free battle axe, I expect to see something huge and nasty.

For a helmet spike, I'd give it dagger stats, possibly a bonus when charging, nothing more.

Does anybody else think that the part about needing 50 castings worth of material components when creating staves is in error? As in, maybe this was left over for when staves had 50 charges? Or am I just not seeing something here.

From the footnotes on the chart of pricing magic items:

4 If item is continuous or unlimited, not charged, determine cost as if it had 100 charges. If it has some daily limit, determine as if it had 50 charges.

It might be a grandfathered rule, but it is still there. 50 seems a good compromise. 10 charges worth of material would be too cheep, 100 too much. Remember: due to the rechargeable nature of staves these days, you can get a lot of milage out of spells with expensive components.

One thing to consider when changing the base weapon is if the new weapon has synergy with the special affects. For example, Life Drinker going from a two handed axe to a one handed is not going to change much, but if you made it a dagger, you could have people duel-weilding them and handing out a boat load of negative levels. You can get the same thing with crit range. If the weapon is balanced with doing something cool when you crit with a 20, it can get game-breakingly good when it starts doing it's thing on a 18-20.

It adds a lot of flavor to shake things up every now and then, just keep an eye on what you are doing.

Do Simulacrums age? If not, you could use one as the BBEG. The original might be long dead, ascended to godhood/lichdom, or just off doing other things. Makes for a good continuation hook once the players kill the villein. If you want to wrap the campaign, he was just a forgotten relic. If you want to keep going, there is someone out there with at least twice the HD of the guy you just offed.

It's magic armor, it should accommodate. Unless your DM is a stickler for random things, don't worry about it.

This is correct. That same armor can be worn by the 5' 4" lithe little thief and the 6' 6" hulking brute barbarian. It's not going to let something as simple as a scrawny extra arm get in the way of protecting your hide. It's magic, that's how it rolls...

From the Starsoul Sorcerer bloodline in the APG:

Breaching the Gulf (Sp): At 15th level, your caster level is increased by 3 when casting spells of the teleportation subschool. In addition, once per day you can teleport a single creature within 30 feet into the void of space if it fails a Will save. The save DC is equal to 10 + 1/2 your sorcerer level + your Charisma modifier. The target can attempt a new saving throw as a full-round action each round to return. While trapped in the airless void, the target takes 6d6 points of cold damage per round and must hold its breath or begin to suffocate.

For a high level environment, 6d6 cold and having to find a way to breathe is not an insurmountable obstacle. I'm not sure if there are other rules out there, but you could use this if they step out of the "safe" zone if you set one up.

Even if they can't be dazed, the spell still will negate concealment and illuminate them like a sunrod. They might be immune to the primary effect of the spell, but it still does things to them. If someone is immune to daze, but still a legal target, they should still make the save every round. The only time it shouldn't land is on illegal targets (non-living targets, allies)

Here are some examples for a game I'm in now.

My enchantress has a +4 headband atm, with Fly and Perception. Unsure what I'll add when I boost it to +6, probably Ride or Handle Animal.

Another wizard in the guild has Sense Motive and Survival. He's a city boy who hates getting lost, and wants to at least roll a die to check when the aforementioned Enchantress is lying.

We also have a fighter with a Spellcraft headband so she can tell what the finger-wigglers are doing.

Do you want no magic gear, or true poverty? If you just want to be able to walk around naked, you might want blow your WBL on stat books, or things like having permanency cast a bunch of times with various spells. This will help compensate for the lack of traditional gear.

You could also specialize in the out of combat side of things. Be the bard that knows everyone and everything, loved by all. Spend fights buffing and hiding in the back. And when you head back to town strut your stuff. There is more that happens in Pathfinder then occurs on the combat grid; own that side of the game.

http://paizo.com/pathfinderRPG/prd/spells/mageSDisjunction.html#_mage-s-dis junction

Mage's Disjunction. 9th level Sor/Wiz spell. I don't think anything less then this will permanently remove magic, but Disjunction will get the job done.

There was a way to do it in 3.5 (at first level even), but I don't think Pathfinder lets you. It opened the early door for a number of prestige classes.

Precocious apprentice from complete arcane for those wondering

What we need to do is start cross-breeding the bears with other, more vicious, animals. Like owls.

It would be nice if it were possible to get a Ring of Forceshield +1 and beyond. That's one area that the Mithral Buckler is better.

I've had GMs house rule this. Just pay for the enchantment normally, treating the ring as a material cost. I really like the concept of the ring of force shield, but mechanically, the buckler is better in most situations.

Another thing in the ring's favor are the shield related feats that depend on the size of the shield. It is a heavy shield after all.

Ancestry recitation. Hold a pint high and recite your heritage as far back as you can, no breaks, don't drink the beer till you are done. This is a test of both endurance (how long can you hold the pint above shoulder level) and knowledge of history (you have to know your family history) both "traditional" dwarven values.

This event started as a case of one-upmanship during the opening feast of a past Olympics, but caught on, and now is part of the regular games.

Tani Briarfliff wrote:

Opposed Schools: Necromancy & Divination

Necromancy makes sense, but divination, while an inferior school, has some very essential spells; Namely read magic and detect magic, two very useful spells that I doubt you want to use too many extra slots for.

Party composition is key (for me at least) when thinking about taking divination as an opposed school. There are critical spells in there, but how many people in the party need to have Detect magic memorized? It's on everyone's list. And you can always buy/make a wand/scroll to keep on hand for the times when you personally need to cast it. 0-level spell items are cheep.

While not cheep, Games Workshop makes a number of dragons with riders.

Quality minis, but a bit overpriced...

The next question is what type of action is to pluck the sphere and throw it - Standard (as per normal magic item activation) or an attack action (Fireballs flying left right and centre). I would say Standard, but would love it if it was just an attack action (Unless I was on the recieving end)

While not fireballs, you might want to look at Javelin's of Lightning for your AOE spell as an attack action goodness...

Pretty much everyone agrees that the Martial Weapon Proficiency feat is more or less totally dumb. Would it make it more worth it to instead have the feat apply to all the martial weapons in a given fighter weapon group? So instead of picking Martial Weapon Proficiency (Greatsword), you could pick Martial Weapon Proficiency (Heavy Blades), and get the Greatsword, Greataxe, Bastard Sword (2H), Longsword, and so on. This might actually encourage people to take the feat, especially combat classes that don't get a lot of weapon proficiencies they might want (Inquisitor, Alchemist, etc.)

I'm thinking this is how I'm going to handle it in my games. What do you all think?

Sounds good to me. It's a nice middle ground between one weapon and everything. Another option to tack on would be to allow the racial groups. So an Elven wizard could blow a feat on martial weapon proficiency (elven) so he can actually be proficient in all the weapons with "elven" in the name that he gets to treat as martial weapons.

I had a rouge who skimmed from the group. I handled all the appraisal, selling, and distribution of excess loot (as I had the skills and contacts to move stuff). I kept track of the party fund. When it came time to hand out gold, people would get a bag of 1,500 GP, rather then the 1,513 GP, 2 SP and 6 coppers that should have been their fair, mathematical split. Everyone knew I took a little off the top to keep the numbers even, but didn't care, in character or out. I handled all the player-side bookkeeping for the game and took a little extra for my trouble.

In a game I'm playing now we have a similar situation. Our rouge will put in the extra leg work to sell things with historical/special value to interested parties, rather then just dumping on the counter of the local blacksmith/magic mart. She gets a higher price, and pockets most of it. The party still gets the normal "book" value, or above, and she gets a bit of extra spending cash. It's not enough to blow the WBL guidelines, so it's all good. We don't ask what price she actually got; she put in the extra work and gets rewarded for it.

She does tend to pocket keys without telling us, but opening locked doors is part of her job.

Bonus points if the creature that swallowed you whole is flying or is a swimming air breather.

So what else happens beyond possibly being held in place or being slowed? How best to represent that stomache-ache?

Could the creature involved possibly, if it can make the required movements, move itself backwards so that the rod is guided back up the throat? Escape Artist check or something else, and at what DC?

Alternatively, could the creature possibly cut it out and depend on muscular action to close the hole like always?

...got to thinking about this while thinking about using immovable rods in car/wagon chases....

How long is this:

Physical Description: Rods weigh approximately 5 pounds. They range from 2 feet to 3 feet long and are usually made of iron or some other metal. (Many, as noted in their descriptions, can function as light maces or clubs due to their hardy construction.) These sturdy items have AC 9, 10 hit points, hardness 10, and a break DC of 27.

going to last in the stomach of a swallow whole monster? Hardness 10 and 10 HP might only last as long as last night's burritos. I'd go with a Heal check, rather then escape artist to work it out of your system. Probably DC 20.

Bonus points for originality. Love this idea.

Is he aware of his problems? One of the players in my group has a shaky grasp of the rules, and has problems with modifiers. He asked that we audit his character, check his numbers, and make cheat-sheets for him.

Spell cards are great, as are printing out lists of the feats he has. Ease of access without overload is the goal.

Cheating via ignorance/incompetence is a lot easier to deal with then malicious cheating.

Of course: a Vampires dominate ability and the spell work the same.

The thing is that you do not have to control the creature all the time - you can give a command:

Quote:

Once you have given a dominated creature a command, it continues to attempt to carry out that command to the exclusion of all other activities except those necessary for day-to-day survival (such as sleeping, eating, and so forth).

The question is: Is the command obeyed even if the dominator is dead?

We have always played it that way. A lot of fights end with us subduing a companion and hoping the Break Enchantment works.

Is it possible for a spellcaster to research a spell that is not on his class list of available spells but does exist on another character class’s spell list?

Listed below are a few examples that several characters in our current game are thinking about researching.

A Cleric who wants to research the spell “Gravity Bow”? This spell per the rules is only available to Rangers, Sorcerers, and Wizards as a first level spell.

A Magus who wants to research the spells “Gravity Bow” and “Lead Blades”? The “Lead Blades” spell per the rules is only available to Rangers as a first level spell.

Please note Magus does not want to use the Magus Arcana abilities Spell Blending or Broad Study to acquire the spells.

If the spell can be researched should the level of the spell be changed or remain the same.

Talk to your GM.

Not to sound like the normal brush-off answer, but that's what spell research is. It's you asking for something not covered by the normal rules. Which is firmly in "Ask your GM" territory. In theory you could research a 1st level spell that turns you into a god. Any sane GM would laugh at you for suggesting it though... I believe there are guidelines in Ultimate Magic for what is appropriate.

If you are a cleric for the Goddess of the Hunt, Gravity Bow fits in nicely. I might give it to you a level later then Sor/Wiz because it is outside the normal things clerics do. I'd only let clerics research spells appropriate to their gods. Keep it in theme, I'll reward you. Try to munchkin/powergame, you get the big NO!

I'm not that familiar with the Magus's list, so can't speak for specifics. I don't think there would be a problem, but can't speak to the details.

If an enchantress wants to learn something off the bard's list, I'd probably be fine with that. particularly if there wasn't a bard in the game. I worry less about protecting classes schticks when none of the PCs are playing them.

One thing to keep in mind is spell lists based off of full and partial casters. Not all spell levels are created equal. Look at the level classes can cast the spells in addition to just the raw spell level.

If the archer only has arrows in an efficient quiver, a targeted dispel magic will turn it off for 1d4 rounds.

The dispel item trick will lightly irritate the swordsman, as he still gets to stab you with his (now masterwork) sword. You seal off the archer's quiver, she has to look for other options.

If they have spare arrows in their haversack, it takes a move action to get them out. If they keep their spares in a bag of holding or a portable hole, it takes longer then that. If they are back at camp/at home then they are out of luck.

Our group also plays that if you are affected by a dimensional lock/anchor you can't get into your extra-dimentional spaces, so that's another way of shutting down archers reliant of magic quivers. Antimagic fields also work for this.

Of course, just having a normal quiver strapped to the side of your backpack will fix this. But with the ROF of high level archers, this won't last long. Plus it's wake up call surprise the first time you pull it.

On a different note: remember that if you don't have the strength to pull you composite bow you take a -2 to hit. So STR drain/damage will not just cut down the damage, but the to hit as well. 2 points of dex damage will cause an archer -1 to hit, 2 points of str will cause them -2 to hit and -1 damage (assuming their bow is exactly at their strength) Unless you are talking large numbers (5+) strength damage can be more detrimental.

Some very nice ideas here, folks.

I'm leaning towards an "Assault Marine" specialist, with the suggested Half-Giant race from above. After talking with the GM, neither of us really want to introduce firearms into AoW, so will be going Sword & Shield variety. Additionally, we nixed the Psionic powers in favor of Large sized carry capacity.

Now, just gotta get my hands on a jump-pack and some frags...

Keep 'em coming, though, I love this stuff!

Frag grenades can be as simple as some flasks of acid/alchemist fire, or as big as a necklace of fireballs.

Wings of flying can double as a jump pack, but I'd aim for an assault terminator in adamantine full plate (boots of teleportation optional) Thunder hammer/storm shield should be easy to do.

I think the OP was asking about the two new spells you add to your spell book at each new level.

PFSRD Wizard wrote:

Spells Gained at a New Level: Wizards perform a certain amount of spell research between adventures. Each time a character attains a new wizard level, he gains two spells of his choice to add to his spellbook. The two free spells must be of spell levels he can cast. If he has chosen to specialize in a school of magic, one of the two free spells must be from his specialty school.

so, no. A lvl 2 wiz can only add a 1st lvl spell for his two free spells per level. Conversely, you must be at least lvl 15 to add a free lvl 8 spell as your free 2 for leveling, as this is the lowest level you can cast 8th level spells.

Edge case that will probably never come up, but what would happen when a wizard with an 11 INT hit 3rd level? Could he add 2nd level spells to his book, or only more 1st level ones because that's what he is limited to casting (due to his crummy INT)?

ciretose wrote:

Spellbooks are incredibly valuable. That is like saying no one would steal gold from a wizard.

Gold pieces generally don't have booby-traps. Also, the very value of a spellbook makes it harder to dispose of. It's easy to fence a few pieces of jewelry; a spellbook takes somebody with serious money to move it. Kind of like stealing expensive art, you should have a buyer lined up before you steal it.

Even then, duplication of resources (i.e. spells) means that any buyer will really only want a small portion of most spellbooks, as they probably already have a good portion of the spells in their own books. This means that it's more cost effective to legitimately acquire the few spells you need than buy up a whole spellbook for its market value (sum total of spells).

Of course, wizards could just steal spellbooks themselves, but that's another story. And there will always be somebody dumb enough to not consider the consequences; criminals are often both stupid and greedy.

Enchanting your spellbook as an intelligent item with Speech is probably a good place to start. When your spellbook can identify itself to authorities, it's a lot riskier to dispose of (and harder to steal). Adding 1000gp to the price of a Blessed Book isn't much (500gp base, Int 10, speech).

Stealing spellbooks is all about the risk vs. the reward. It is incredibly dangerous. But if you can pull it off, there is a lot of profit that can be made. Joe the street-rat is not going to try his hand at it. But the high level thief who wants something else to do besides pulling the gems out of statues in active temples might give it a shot. He loves the danger, is a little crazy, and has the skills/resources/contacts to make it work.

It takes a special kind of crazy to rip-off adventurers. These are the guys that go into dragon lairs and kill monsters for fun and profit. If they figure out you screwed them, they will be back, and will be PISSED. Assuming they do come back. Very high mortality rate. Even higher when they are using shoddy goods.

Any smart, respectable, shopkeeper is going to want to build a solid reputation with the local adventurers. When they do come back from the dragon's lair, they have stuff to sell and cartloads of gold to buy stuff with. Building a rapport with them can have very nice long-term results.

But if you are buying wands off the back of a cart from a sleazy merchant, caveat emptor.

I think the original feat is a little overpowered, but not game-breakingly so. It might just be the games my group tends to play. We lean towards "hurry-up and save the world", so it's not just the gold you save scribing the extra spells into your book, but the time. Also, for whatever reason, we tend not to see wizards as BBEGs, so capture very few spellbooks. Our table is just not very wizard friendly in game play, so this feat helps make up for that (and thus, feels very powerful.)

In a more "stock" game, with plenty of downtime, easy access to magic shops and scrolls, and a more normal chance of capturing spellbooks, I think there is no problem with the feat (or the trait you proposed)

On a semi-related note, I think this trait should be given for free to universalist wizards to give them an edge in spells known vs. spells per day of the specialists.

I keep it in the bottom of my backpack when not actively reading it. I might have a sepia snake sigil, don't recall if I got around to putting that on.

A little more detail:

The wizard I'm currently playing is a 10th level Enchantress, who is part of a large adventuring guild which contains 3 other wizards. I have two back ups. One is my old spellbook, from before I got a blessed book and copied everything over. I think I was 6th level at the time (so it has a selection up to 3rd level spells. The other is a crystal spellbook (from the Eberron setting) which I keep a 20 pages worth of emergency spells in. If something ever happened to my active book, I could just use the spares, or use the books of the other guild wizards to re-scribe all the spells I need. We generally make sure that no spell can only be found in one book.

I realize that most adventuring wizards don't have a nice safety net like I do in case they need to reconstruct their books, so might want to have a good back up. With the luxury of being able to get everything back without having to pay before hand I can skip that.

But you wanted real game stories, and that's mine.

Generally I think people should make their own characters. Taking over NPCs works well when it's hard to work someone totally new into the story.

That being said, I'm a fan of pre-gens. I've been gaming a long time, I tend to make the same type of characters. It can be a lot of fun to be handed something out of your normal zone and play it. Stretches the role-playing muscles.

In a game I'm in now my dragon blooded sorcerer got shot dead by a ranger. I ended up taking control of a free-spirited enchantress we had rescued with necromancy and transmutation as her opposed schools. Something I -Never- would have built myself. And I'm having a blast.

YMMV.

And if he makes it to the next level to buy some ranks in linguistics, he can always learn the new languages from the evil voices in his head. Kinda surprising how well educated those dark whispers are, you can learn so much if you just listen to what they have to say...

I also agree to cutting the guy some slack. Particularly with replacement characters. If he was played from 1st level, the flaw would have been obvious and corrected. Starting above that, you miss out on the checks and balances of organic character growth.

also all you heavy armour wearers have chainshirt pyjamas right?

At low levels owning two sets of armor can be difficult. Both from a cost point of view, and the encumbrance dragging both around (probably don't have a haversack or a bag of holding yet).

At high levels I sleep with a potion of mage armor under my pillow.

As others have pointed out, being prone sucks. But there are a lot of ways to deal with it. Don't forget that you can delay your action. So you can wait for someone else to eat the AoO, bull rush the bad guy, or just kill him. Then you can stand up safely.

The second-last line of the spell description reads:

"Spells cast on other targets are vulnerable to dispel magic as
normal."

Now, when you say "other", you are usually making an exception to a subject matter. If you are talking about birds, then "other creatures" refers to any creature other than birds.

My question is: what is the subject matter that is being excepted to in the spell description? Are there targets for which a spell made permanent with a permanency spell will not be subject to dispel magic? Or should the word 'other' be omitted to avoid confusion, such that the line reads:

"Spells cast on targets (and areas?) are vulnerable to dispel magic as
normal."

Personal permanencied spells have a caster level restriction to dispell:

You cannot cast these spells on other creatures. This application of permanency can be dispelled only by a caster of higher level than you were when you cast the spell.

The line you quoted just lets you know to use the normal dispel rules for everything else.

or at least, that's my reading.

How many items of negligible weight equal one pound. I heard somewhere that it's 10 but I can't find a rule that backs this up.

I need to know because I'm making a gun slinger as a backup character for pathfinder society in case my current one dies, and need to know how many paper alchemical cartridges I can carry.

In the 3.0 PHB there was a notation for "10 of these weight a pound" The only things on the basic equipment list noted as such were wooden holy symbols and signal whistles. There may have been other objects in other books. There was still the annotation for "negligible weight" which covered all the same sort of things that have that note today. 3.5 PHB dropped the 10 to a pound notation, probably figuring it wasn't worth bothering with that level of detail.

While I don't play in society games, my understanding is that they are strict RAW. By the RAW you can have as many "-" weight objects as you can afford.

At my table I'd probably cap you at 10-20 per pound, depending on the object.

Longspears and aid other for mooks. You can have a big block of troops with reach weapons aiding each other so one of them actually has a chance to hit the PCs AC.

Can you use a heavy shield in two hands when you attack with it useing Improved Shield Bash and still get it's shield bonus to AC?

This would add damage to a shield build.

also when two weapon fighting with a Heavy Shield and a Short Sword, can the Shield be declared the primary weapon?? or dose it have to be the offhand weapon?? [/QUOTE

I don't see why you wouldn't be able to use both hands on a heavy shield for the 1.5x STR damage. You are basically putting your entire body behind the blow. And Imp. shield bash is pretty clear on keeping your AC while bashing, so that shouldn't be a problem.

Unfortunately, shields are expressly called out as off-hand weapons.

Quote:

Shield Bash Attacks: You can bash an opponent with a heavy shield, using it as an off-hand weapon.

So RAW I think you are stuck with that. Not that I think there would be any problem swapping things around. Shield bash is not exactly game breaking, mechanically...

I'd suggest the atonement spell as a way to do it. RAW I don't think you can, but I don't see it as game breaking. Domains are core to the personality and faith of a cleric, you shouldn't be changing them casually. But it sounds like you aren't doing it lightly.

One thing to consider is "why?" It sounds like you have an in-game reason to change, and aren't doing it for power. So I'd let it fly. If you had just found a new, more powerful, domain in a splatbook and just wanted a mechanical power boost, I'd say "no"

I'd be tempted to just leave it at 3 or I'd hesitantly bump it up to 4. It requires a specific type: evil outsider, undead. Combined with the fact that it's a single target attack with a smaller subeffect makes it less useful in most circumstances vs. Fireball which affects everything (and can have its damage type changed via metamagic or class feature).

3rd sounds about right. It's a damage spell, which clerics should not be the best at. It does focus on things they should be fighting. You don't need to worry about the splash on your friends, which is nice. I think it would be under powered for a 4th level spell.

As a splashy/bomby spell, you might also want to add alchemists to the list of casters.

Can you permanency shrink item on a magic weapon in pathfinder? Can I have a magic Longspear that can shrink on command?

You are able to shrink one nonmagical item (if it is within the size limit) to 1/16 of its normal size in each dimension (to about 1/4,000 the original volume and mass). This change effectively reduces the object's size by four categories. Optionally, you can also change its now shrunken composition to a clothlike one. Objects changed by a shrink item spell can be returned to normal composition and size merely by tossing them onto any solid surface or by a word of command from the original caster. Even a burning fire and its fuel can be shrunk by this spell. Restoring the shrunken object to its normal size and composition ends the spell.

Shrink item can be made permanent with a permanency spell, in which case the affected object can be shrunk and expanded an indefinite number of times, but only by the original caster.

Bolding mine.

Not with the Shrink Item spell. You could have a masterwork one shrunk, and keep it and an oil of greater magic weapon in your pocket for emergencies though.

In 3.5 there were a few different ways to re-size spears in the magic item compendium (collapsable, changeling) but I'm unsure if any found their way to official Pathfinder products.