Malleus Aforethought's page

Problem 1: Surviving as Shadowcaster to 18th level.

Problem 2: Coup de Grace requires a melee weapon according 3.5. Used d20 SRD, but I believe that the PHB says the same thing:

"As a full-round action, you can use a melee weapon to deliver a coup de grace to a helpless opponent. You can also use a bow or crossbow, provided you are adjacent to the target."

http://www.d20srd.org/srd/combat/combatModifiers.htm#coupdeGrace

So, it takes at least 2 rounds, assuming you get initiative. If you don't, character probably won't survive.

Theoretically speaking, isn't the warlord a Leader rather than a Defender? Could explain the whole losing consciousness thing.

Malleus Aforethought wrote:

Isn't this move to halt PDF sales actually going to hurt their lawsuit? My recollection of U.S. copyright law (IANAL) is that in order to collect damages on copyright infringement, you have to demonstrate that the act in question negatively impacted your sales/income/insert some lawyerly term here. Or are they just going for the "moral" win here?

No, because the PDF pirating can also be argued to be hurting print sales too.

Even so, killing off a segment of revenue can't be helpful to their argument.

[EDIT: inadvertently switched identities...]

Isn't this move to halt PDF sales actually going to hurt their lawsuit? My recollection of U.S. copyright law (IANAL) is that in order to collect damages on copyright infringement, you have to demonstrate that the act in question negatively impacted your sales/income/insert some lawyerly term here. Or are they just going for the "moral" win here?

Several posts then discuss the DM's responsibility to adjust scenarios appropriately. Counter-argument, of course, is that published modules are suppose to be played "as is" since folks buy them to make gaming easier.

I beg your pardon?

When I saw the title of the thread, my first assumption was that Cato Novus had posted it. :)

The problem is known as dominance in game theory. I've seen it play out in many forms, usually because the DM (me in most cases) makes an error or bad assumption which cascades out in unexpected ways. In some cases, sitting down with the player and discussing how the dominant strategy is warping the game has resulted in a happy compromise. In other cases, I've had a player that simply couldn't break the habit (it was part of his mind set--and he was good at it). No matter how many times the dominance was corrected, he would seek out a new dominant strategy. Fortunately, the problem never broke up our friendship or the game, but it was often frustrating for both parties.

It often manifests in D&D as the Scry-Buff-Teleport strategy. Or, in the current game in which I am a player, the Knock strategy. My DM hates [i]knock[/], and he let's us know every time I use it. But from a player perspective, it's a life saver. We just keep reminding him that it's a good thing it doesn't work in D&D like it does in Neverwinter Nights.

Wiki Link

Game theory link

It is impossible to predict the reason a customer could be calling in, and also impossible to go over every single situation that can arise on the phone....

I call these people "Screen Monkeys," capable of only performing a task if the procedure is spelled out for them step by step for them on the computer screen. Yes, it's derogatory, but it's very frustrating in dealing with someone who obviously has no clue what they're parroting when I am a certified subject matter expert in the field. Not sure I would apply it (or Larry's description--as he's probably not getting the best and brightest in their hiring pool if turn-over is that high) overly broadly to the nextgen gamers...<shrug/>. From reading the article though, I can certainly see that I am a GenX gamer. :) In some ways, despite my continued loathing of WotC for their handling of the 4E intro, I'm kind of glad that 4E does seem to have found an audience, even if it's obvious that I'll never be part of it. It's somewhat ironic in that the more I've meditated on 4E, the more I tend to conclude that in in many ways 4E really did go back to the very roots of D&D and came up with a tactical tabletop wargaming system in which the mechanics are a thin veil over the central focus of what's occurring on the table. But I've never been a big board game player as an adult (and that is not intended as a barb--many people do enjoy them--it's just not my shtick).

I'm currently running a level 16-ish campaign, and one thing I've noticed is the PC's spell DCs are really low compared to their opponent's saving throw modifiers. It's a swashbuckling campaign, so a lot of the NPCs are mooks with evasion, which totally frustrates the evoker. She has Spell Focus and Greater Spell Focus, a relatively high Int (including a +6 Int item), so I don't know what else to do.

Undo the 3.5 changes to Spell Power and the other DC nerfs. This should add +3 to +8 to the DCs depending on the feats the evoker has, including, if I recall correctly, double the bonuses for specializing. Of coursse, this goes both ways, but then, so should the other house rules mentioned here. But since the ones I suggested require feats or specialization (the original Red Wizard PrC has Spell Power as a class feature), they can be a little easier to control since the DM is the final arbiter of which feats an NPC has.

Hm... if I was a DM and saw this as a problem I would have to say the player is going to feel really really crummy when he shoots that little kid playing in the room.

Consequences. That's the name of the game. A bunch of trigger-happy psychos are eventually going to do something at least one of them will probably regret. One of my players still has a guilt trip over gunning down a goblin-child playing in a barn they were pilfering from (TORG) since they got into a shoot-first-Haste-shoot-again-and-then-maybe-think-about-asking-questions mode. Same player also bemoans the fate of some farmers that died horribly because the party insisted that they were entitled to stay in the barn (traditional fantasy trope, after all) even though they knew they were being trailed by a creature of evil. Now they understand why common people lock all the doors and windows and stay inside and aren't chatty with strangers that show up on the threshold on that night.

On the other hand, I'm not sure I agree with the previous post about the order. Unless something in the room was alerted to the rogue picking the lock, the surprise round should be triggered when the door is opened. Though I do agree about the rogue not being able to ready an action if he's opening the door. Arguing that it should be outside the combat round seems like a bit of meta-gaming chicanery, IMHO. Seems like someone else could do that for him though--the wizard could get some pretty good cover from behind one of those doors after all.

[distraction attempt]As 'someone' is singular, the pronoun 'they' is incorrect, strictly speaking. You could have said 'people' and 'they' or 'someone' and 'he or she'. ... [/distraction attempt]

** spoiler omitted **

Actually, the use of "they" as a singular pronoun in cases where gender is mixed or uncertain is well established, going back, oh, ~300 years or so in the English language. The bias against it is a relatively modern phenomenon.

Great point. This is also true of our goup. We started with Dragonwarriors, moved to Warhammer rolplay, went to Earthdawn (greatest roleplay books to read ever...terrible mechanincs though), now we play 3.5 D&D.

That's because Earthdawnp was developed by one of the greatest creative minds in the RPG industry. If I wanted to be really insulting, I would point out that he had nothing to do with 4e. ;)> Some of his former cohorts did though. I can't say they learned anything from the relationship.

A cleric from my understanding/interpretation of it's iconic idea of a front line healer needs to be able to come up to the front lines and heal, cutting heavy armor would limit this.

Actually, removing Heavy Armor would generally *improve* a cleric's ability to maneuver on the front line, as any Medium-Sized creature immediately gains +10 ft movement effectively.

My theory is the GSL was ready to go, and it is/was very restrictive. The backlash they relaized it would generate was bad for business and they're revising it now to make it more palitable.

You're such a kidder. You realize this is Hasbro we're talking about, right? And that Hasbro just dispatched a new hatchet man to, um, man the helm of WotC, right? That's two strikes for them right there. And the fact that it's still not out is strike three, IMOHO.

Shawn O'Leary wrote:

NO POINTED MANGA EARS on ELVES!

Amen.

Preach it, brotha'.

Donovan Vig wrote:

Respectfully yours,

Donny the Mad DM

You and I clearly don't use the word "respectfully" the same way, because the antagonistic and insulting tone of your posting is anything but respectful to me or to Paizo or Wizards.

I think you may be feeling a little overly sensitive, Mr. Wertz. Let me be frank: I despise the corporate entity that is Hasbro. I am gravely disappointed many of the decisions WotC leadership has made in recent years, especially those that lead up to 4E. I think they continue to stumble, and I think those decisions will ultimately be bad for the industry as a whole.

However, even I don't blame people like you or Lisa Stevens for selling your stake in WotC. Was it the best decision for WotC in the long term? I'll admit, I'm sure it certainly seemed that way in the short term. I would suggest that it may turn out not to be *long term*. But prognostication is a tough thing. If I was in your shoes, I probably would have done the same, especially if I wanted to go off and establish a new start-up in an industry as tough as publishing, much less game publishing.

As I've got futures on my mind of late, I'll go one step further. As you can see from my subscription list, I've made several subscriptions to Paizo and I've also pre-ordered the PFRPG. I'll not be subscribing to DDI or anything like it. If I buy a 4E book, it will be used. And if anyone cares to make a little side bet, I'm betting that WotC will not be around as a game publisher in 10 years time. There will probably still be a CCG business, and I wouldn't be surprised if the miniature game survived in some incarnation, but I don't expect to see a publisher of paper D&D books.

Editing 19k? OMG!

I make over 20,000 USD a year teaching English literature and holding a side job at a University in China (28 teaching hours a week....). My rent on a nice seaside 3 bedroom apartment is 175 dollars a month and a dozen (organic) eggs costs 2 USD. During the summer I will supervise English immersion field trips abroad and make about 4k in a month.

You poor bastards. I'm going to the beach, it's 17 degrees C today.

<threadjack>

Well, if the US Gov manages to tank the national laboratory system, I may have to come talk to you. I've often considered teaching English in Asia as interesting fall-back career.

</threadjack>

No 4E!

After I graduated from college in the mid-90s, I was offered an editorial job I had applied for. The salary was so low (like $19K?) that I just laughed and took a job as a salesman at Egghead Software. I think my best year as a part-time freelancer was maybe something like $4K and half the product I was originally promised, probably less than that. I don't make $75K and now I am a professional egghead.

Broken does not begin to describe it (speaking as a player of one)

It takes one feat, one that a lot of players take anyway, and an elf can qualify easily. You get good BAB, two good saves, decent skill set, d10 HD, and a number of class abilities. With a straight sorcerer/wizard, you can go Wiz 10/Abchamp 5/Archmage 5 and not lose a caster level. Battle Sorcerer you can get into it as early as level 7.

It needs to lose at least one caster level.

Not sure if it's broken, or just non-crippled. After giving up on the Shadowcaster as hopelessly f***** up, I came up with a Wiz/Rgr/AbjChamp/Argent Savant/Master Specialist build which the DM approved. I'm looking forward to seeing how it works out. Although the build will lose 9th-level spells, the caster level will ranger from lower 20s to high 20s depending on school etc, due to feats and class abilities. It's not optimized, and will be fairly powerful in a couple of areas (dispelling/countering) and imp/mage armor/shield combos.

It should be fun in a few more levels when the prestige classes start to kick in.

I thought I read an article by Gygax many years ago where told this story somewhere along the line (or maybe it's just apocryphal):

The original draft of the D&D rules called for 1d6/10 ft/10 ft. That is, the damage is cumalative, with 10 feet being 1d6, but 20 feet being 3d6, and maxing out at 20d6 at 60 feet (which I think is about right for terminal velocity--remember you are accelerating at almost 10 meters per second). However, an editor thought the second "per 10 feet" was an error and deleted it and the rules were published as 1d6/10 feet, max 20d6.

Come to think of it, I wonder if that's why ended up as an editor with a math minor...?

I've always used what I consider the canonical falling damage in D&D. It's slightly scarier. Maybe we can bring that back in Pathfinder RPG. Though, with the escalation of HP in the last couple of editions, maybe the damage die should be increased to a d8 or d10. Pushes that massive damage potential a lot closer.

If you go back and read the first edition ranger class, you will see that it was intended to model Aragorn, right down to the name of the class. Little bit of clerical magic to model his healing abilities, a little bit of wizardry to model his Dunedain and elven heritage (his line was descended from Elrond's brother) and probably his long association with Gandalf. Then there's the specific bonus to crystal balls to model Aragorn's ability to master the Palantir. Etc.

Then came second edition and Drizz't which generated the next generation model of a ranger.

Much of 2nd carried over to 3rd with the magical abilities for formalized as divine, with some druid class abilities tacked on, and the combat abilities formalized as a series of feat-like choices. Basically, a conversion of the old versions of the ranger to the new rules.

The question is, I guess, is there a new archetype that fits the idealized ranger (1st edition), or will it inform a new archetype (2nd).

If you don't threaten, you can't make an attack of opportunity. The rest is left as an exercise for the OP.