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Lifting and Dragging: A character can lift as much as his maximum load over his head. A character’s maximum load is the highest amount of weight listed for a character’s Strength in the heavy load column of Table 7–4.

A character can lift as much as double his maximum load off the ground, but he or she can only stagger around with it. While overloaded in this way, the character loses any Dexterity bonus to AC and can move only 5 feet per round (as a full-round action).

A character can generally push or drag along the ground as much as five times his maximum load. Favorable conditions can double these numbers, and bad circumstances can reduce them by half or more.

I would say that you are limited to a 5' movement as you are over-encumbered while pushing and dragging, but (unless you are on an incline) you can let go of the load at any moment, so you don't suffer the Dexterity loss.

I have the same question but am coming at it from a completely different perspective which makes me disagree with the 5' conclusion.

I'm going through the overland movement rules wondering how fast my mule drawn wagon goes, and if dragging always counts as carrying then carts and carriages always have a movement speed of 5', which is 1/2 mile per hour, or 3 miles a day. Since carts and wagons have a 16 miles per day line in the vehicles section, we know that dragging is faster than overloaded with a 5' movement speed.

The challenge I'm having is with the cart/wagon entry of 16 miles per day. There are a wide variety of draft animals with varying speeds and strengths, so I'm not a fan of the indiscriminate 2 mph for every cart or wagon.

Since the most affordable draft animal is a mule at 8 gp, and it has a speed of 4 mph, and the speed of a wagon is conveniently half the speed of the cheapest draft animal, this implies to me that any creature's drag speed is half of it's normal speed.

I found myself thinking about how the customer-shopkeep interaction would unfold realistically. Terms like +1 longsword or +2 chain shirt make sense when you think about it in terms of a rules set, but if you're writing a script or novel, I'm having a little trouble not envisioning the whole thing acted out by the good folks at Viva la Dirt League.

An armor clad figure walks into a shop, and sees two swords on display. The first costs 2,315 gp, and the second costs 8,315 gp. When asked about the first sword, the shopkeep explains that the sword will magically guide itself to the vulnerable spots of a quarry's armor and multiplies the force on impact. When asked about the second sword, the shopkeep nervously says that, well, it does the same thing but, more! Like, twice as much more. There are even swords that exist that does it three times more!

I cannot think of a way to role play buying a +1 piece of equipment that doesn't play out a comedy. It's even worse when I try to in-character explain the difference between a +1 and +2 piece of equipment.

In your group that is R-O-L-E play more than R-O-L-L play, how do you handle discussing basic magical equipment? Maybe it's best not to allow +2 equipment and after the initial +2 only allow the other magical bonuses (flaming, vorpal, etc..)?

Thanks!

LordQulex wrote:

Hark wrote:

Why not add strength to AC?

Logically speaking, the physical power of a character helps in no way to avoid or absorb an attack. Adding constitution to AC, your character being physically resilient, there's a logical argument for that.

"Logically speaking" being very strong enables you to produce an equal and opposite force to incoming blows, thus negating their effectiveness, thus increasing your AC.

"Logically speaking" is a term that, when applied to the abstractions of game mechanics, usually can be parsed as "I want this to be so..."

Good point. I understand that all role playing games reside somewhere on the spectrum between abstraction and simulation. Perry does exist, but Pathfinder combat is on the abstraction side of the spectrum in order to simplify and speed up play. There are systems out there better than Pathfinder at simulating blow-for-blow fencing or martial arts.

But we're deviating from the topic; based on the number of threads I've read, the community agrees that adding one's dexterity modifier to finesse and ranged damage makes a certain sense, and is something that is widely desired. In fact, it makes so much sense and is so desirable that the game designers added it in the way of unchained rogues and weapon enhancements.

So I ask again to reiterate, why is it that adding this across the board would break the system?

Why not add strength to AC?

Logically speaking, the physical power of a character helps in no way to avoid or absorb an attack. Adding constitution to AC, your character being physically resilient, there's a logical argument for that.

In my mind adding dexterity to damage represents your character's ability to place a shot in a baddie's weak spot, or stabbing an adversary in an unarmored location. You know, how rapiers were actually used in the renaissance era... It makes logical sense to me and to the community as there is no shortage of people asking how to add dexterity to damage.

There are a lot of threads about ways to add a PC's dexterity modifier to damage. Mostly revolving around unchained rogues, agile weapon enhancement, gunslingers and mythic weapon finesse. I feel I have a handle on the how, but now that I'm running a home game I want to understand the why.

Why shouldn't I allow a) weapon finesse to add a PC's dexterity modifier to melee damage and b) ranged attacks get the dexterity modifier to damage.

My theory revolves primarily around the fighter class both in the sense that I want a ranged fighter to be as effective as a melee fighter, as well as making sure that the fighter class doesn't become obsolete by allowing rogues or rangers to out-perform in and out of combat.

A basic fighter adds his strength modifier to attack and damage modifiers. Logically it follows that if a fighter uses a bow, should he add his dexterity modifier to attack and damage rolls it is fair and balanced when focused solely on the fighter. But when you look at the party as a whole, the melee fighter is free to take helpful feats like power attack, cleave, weapon focus, and the like to maximize his usefulness while a ranged fighter is nearly required to take point blank shot and precise shot just to be basically effective. Two feats is a steep price to pay to be a viable character, let alone the penalty of adding damage only with strength via compound bows or thrown weapons, and not threatening thus no AOOs for ranged attackers without *another* feat and even then only within 5 feet. As well, 1000+ gp to create a weapon that adds dexterity modifier to damage is a high cost when the strength fighter gets it automatically and can get a flat +1 to attack and damage for that same price.

Even when observed through the lens of Pathfinder Society, and extra 2-4 damage at low levels is mediocre at best IMHO. For home games at level 8-14 the extra 4-6 damage is low compared to the sneak attack dice of rogues or anything a wizard can do frankly.

So what am I missing? Why is not adding your dexterity to finessed weapons and ranged attacks fair and balanced? Or alternatively, why is adding your dexterity damage to finessed and ranged weapons OP?

Thanks!

As I mentioned in my review, there are a few questions I have about this product's content before I use it in my next campaign.

Editing Observations:

There are 3 uses of the word "sale", and 2 of them should be "sail." Surge forward action, and Withdraw action.

Questions:

A ship can move the cardinal directions and along the diagonals. It is intended that they utilize the "every other diagonal move counts double" as per the Pathfinder rules, or no? If so, and an airship has a movement value of 5, 8, 11, etc, is it intended that it can "shift" one square along a cardinal direction as the odd point?

Turning... ok here goes... This reads to me like a ship can turn at any point on it's initiative, but then must move at least half it's movement value, rounded up, to turn a second time. The addition "and may not turn more than ninety degrees in a turn under normal circumstances", does this imply that a ship may not turn more than ninety degrees per initiative round, or per turn-movement-action? This gets exasperated when you take ship hull shape into account with their extra turns. Example, if I have a ship hull with a speed of 4, can I turn, move 2, turn, then use my extra end of movement turn to have turned a total of 135 degrees?

Lesser Animate Dead from Ultimate Magic lets you create basic skeletons and zombies for free. This will be sufficient for the bulk of not evil necromantic purposes: drawing a cart, simple manual labor, ablative armor, carrying their lord and master on a throne or litter, etc...

Fast Zombie is probably debatable whether it should increase CR or not. Not staggered and an extra attack is probably worth a lot more than DR 5/slashing on most creatures. I would say it is one average a CR + .5.

In addition, the table is HD 3 - 4 is a CR 1 creature. Obviously a 3 HD Zombie is less dangerous than a 4 HD (in general anyway) so 3 HD is probably toward the bottom of the CR 1 band, and 4 HD is probably toward the top.

Lastly, by having the advanced template included in the base creature, but not having the CR increase count once it becomes a zombie, you are still adding on the mechanical aspects (for the most part) but taking away the CR adjustment. What you mechanically have is an Advanced (Fast Zombie (Horse)) not a Fast Zombie(Advanced Horse).

So this is probably a creature that is right near the best of what should be considered CR 2, or possibly just makes it into CR 3. Especially with templates, the CR calculations are an estimate, not an exact science.

Still, a fast zombie heavy horse shouldn't be much of a challenge for a first level party, certainly not a TPK. I can't see this thing surviving a full round of the characters attacks unless they get quite unlucky. If it does get off a full attack of its own though, it does seem likely that it will drop, but probably not kill, one PC.

I am still confused about two aspects.

* Does the natural armor from advanced stack with zombie, or should I take the higher of the two?
* I feel logically I made a Fast Zombie(Advanced(Horse)), and if I applied the templates in Advanced(Fast Zombie(Horse)) order it would be CR 2 not 1. Can you explain how you came to the conclusion of your nesting explanation?

Thanks for all the help and insight!

I was thinking about building an Undead Lord and thought it was cool to have a mount as my undead companion so I started crunching the numbers. Horse, plus the advanced temple, plus the zombie template, realize staggered is terrible so make it a fast zombie, and done.

Take a step back and see you've made a glass cannon with 18 hp and 5 natural attacks it gets from a full-round: 2 hooves, a bite, a zombie slam, and a fast zombie extra slam, for an average damage in the 40's with +9's to hit and +6's to damage (except the secondary hoof attacks). I'm a bit confused whether the natural armors stack (+2 from advanced, +3 from zombie), but the CR table in zombie says 4 HD is a CR 1 creature... Like heck.

What am I missing? In my gut I feel this is NOT a CR 1 creature; it will down any level 1 character in one decent hit. This has the potential for a total party wipe. Did I build this wrong? Do the natural armor bonuses stack, or do you take the +3? (I can't find the "apply multiple template" rules that I remember.)

Thanks!

You can earn half your profession check in gold pieces per week of dedicated work. So a level 1 commoner with 4 points in profession (farmer) and skill focus (profession(farmer)), taking 10, makes 8gp a week. But when trying to make an authentic economy, what exactly does that mean? It could mean 800 pounds of wheat, or 400 pounds of flour...

How much land can one farmer work in a week? How much of what exactly does the farmer produce? How many farmers does it take to support a city of what size using what square footage of farm land? I'm trying to create a medieval-fantasy post-apocalyptic world and getting supply/demand just right is pivotal in the setting.

I know I've read the rules in WotC D&D 3.5 somewhere, but I can't seem to find it again. I've seen other posts that mention A Magical Medieval Society: Western Europe, or the Stronghold Builders Guide, I've even checked the PHB, DMG, and DMG 2 and just can't find it again. I know it's been officially written down somewhere.