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I'm looking for official clarification or ruling on hidden weapons and Sleight of Hand used in combat scenarios. All quotes are taken from d20pfsrd.

Sleight of Hand common uses:

Drawing a hidden weapon is a standard action and doesn’t provoke an attack of opportunity.

Another common use feature:

You can draw a light weapon without anyone noticing.

Check: A successful DC 20 Sleight of Hand check allows you to unobtrusively draw a weapon or other object no larger or longer than a light weapon (which includes potions, but not wands or alchemist bombs). Observers can notice you drawing the item as normal with opposed Perception checks. Creatures carefully observing you gain a +4 bonus on this Perception check.

First queation: what is the difference between drawing a weapon through "Draw Hidden Weapon" or "Palm Weapon"?

Is the weapon drawn using the "Draw Hidden Weapon" feature still considered concealed or hidden after it is drawn? (Same question for "Palm Weapon".)

If the answer to both questions is no, then when is a weapon considered hidden or concealed for the purposes of using a concealed weapon to perform an attack?

That is, how can one meet the presented requirement of the "Underhanded" rogue talent.

Benefit: A rogue with this talent gains a +4 circumstance bonus on all Sleight of Hand checks made to conceal a weapon.

Furthermore, if she makes a sneak attack during the surprise round using a concealed weapon that her opponent didn’t know about, she does not have to roll sneak attack damage, and the sneak attack deals maximum damage. A rogue can only use the underhanded talent a number of times per day equal to her Charisma modifier (minimum 0).

Emphasis mine.

To me, it looks like if one is able to draw a hidden weapon (for example, through spring loaded wrist sheath as a swift action) they should be able to both keep the blade hidden and wield it until your target notices it or you use it to make an attack. Is this correct?

Unless one is able to keep a drawn weapon hidden, the wording of the talent makes no sense.

Second question: how does "Deft Palm" talent come into play in all this?

Benefit: A rogue with this talent can make a Sleight of Hand check to conceal a weapon while holding it in plain sight, even while she is being observed.

It allows one to make a Sleight of Hand check to conceal a weapon they are holding in plain sight, seemingly suggesting one cannot normally keep a weapon hidden if they are wielding it?.

If so, then what is the point of the feature of "Palm Weapon" if it doesn't keep your blade concealed aftee drawing it? Likewise, if this is the ruling, using a hidden blade would incur 2 separate checks: one for "Palm Weapon" weapon draw and one for "Deft Palm". Surely this is not the intended ruling?

An alternative ruling / question: instead of hiding one's weapon on their body "Deft Palm" allows one to consider a weapon to be concealed while still holding it and being observed. Does this remove the need to draw the weapon in order to use it to attack? (I assume: yes).

What exactly is the difference between "Deft Palm" talent and the "Palm Weapon" use of Sleight of Hand?

Is the only difference in considering where the weapon is hidden? (Somewhere on the body vs. in hand, wielding the weapon). How about action economy and surprise rounds?

Why are these rules so convulated? Any help in this regard is highly appreciated, thank you.

I would need a little bit of clarification on how ambushes are worked out, specifically with one certain scenario:
Two characters enter a room, where there is a stealthing assassin. The two characters fail their perception checks vs the assassin's stealth check.

The assassin then spends 3 rounds observing his target, and moves in for a kill and attacks.

Now, I am the DM, and the assassin is an NPC. Of the two characters, the other is a wizard (divination) with the Forewarned ability, enabling him to act on surprise rounds. The other is a rogue/cleric (getting attacked By the assassin).

How the attack / initiative should work? Should I have all characters roll their initiatives first (even if the victims are not aware of the assassin) - then proceed to the attack (and if the wizard scores higher initiative then the assassin, the wizard goes first? - even if he has not observed anything yet, as in, no attack done = no visible assassin)

Should the assassin make his attack as per normal regardless? Should the initiatives be rolled AFTER the assassin's attack? How the scene should play out if we go by the book?

The way the scene played out in play was like this:
Since the assassin is getting his jump on his targets, I ruled that this would be the Surprise round, but, I would not roll initiatives, but instead have the assassin go first and then the wizard (because he has forewarned)

The assassin scored natural 20 on his attack against his target, dealt insane damage + sneak attack + death attack + massive damage, and killed his target with that one strike.
Now, the wizard could make his one standard action, which was to cast Hold Person on the assassin. The assassin rolls natural 1 and is held.

Now, I call for initiatives because the surprise round is done and normal combat starts. The wizard rolls natural 1 and scores total of 9. The assassin rolls 4 and scores a total of 9 as well.

I believe in case of a tie, the one who rolled higher would go first, but there was some discussion about the nature of succesfully casting hold person, and losing the effect if the assassin goes first and succeeds on his full-round action will save, effectively negating the spell too soon, so to speak.

So I allow the wizard to go first, and he delivers coup de grace against the helpless assassin and he rolls another natural 1 on his fortitude save and dies.

Something that made the scene a bit absurd was the fact that the assassin was level 18, while the wizard was levl 7.

Anyways, I would just like to know how the scene should had played if it went entirely by the book, and some clarification on these, as the player later messaged me that

1) initiative should be rolled before the surprise round.
2) even if no one is aware of the attacker, they roll initiative (I take he means before the attack happens)
3 The one initiating the surprise round would act even with the worst initiative of everyone involved
4)(he then adds) expect if he had rolled better initiative than the assassin (assuming he means he would had get to act first with better initiative, coupled with Forewarned - despite failing to spot the assassin).

((( I am aware of the wording regarding the start of combat as "When combat begins, all combatants roll initiative." and then proceeding to check if there is a surprise round or not)))

So, I'm running a campaign where the players are students in a school of wizardy studying to become Red Wizards of Thay. Towards the end of their training, they will (and every other student from their year) undergo a trial, gauntlet, wizard's test, where their knowledge of the Art will be tested.

While I have come up with some puzzles and tests, (for instance, how to deal with illusions that can kill you...) I'm in a sore need of more material to use in these tests. The tests are done alone, no party involved. The PCs will be around lvl 5-6 by the time of their graduation, so the difficulty should scale to that (Though higher level spells used to complete some is possible, since scrolls do exist). Also, the tests are designed as a standalone tests, meaning that test #1 will have no impact on test #2, whetever or not the subject succeeds.

What I need is, some ideas / situations where the PCs will be able to demonstrate their knowledge of Art. Each and every school of magic.

The situations can be as simple as using one or two spells to do something, or word puzzle on the nature of some school of magic or anything in between.

The emphasis is on roleplay, more than mechanics, though.

Thanks.

Was wondering if there was any single item or feat perhaps, that would allow free action teleport (or similiar effect; doesn't need to be too long a distance jumped) to be used in a combat to effectively teleport next to someone, and still be able to take full round action.

Sticking to the core classes; without archetypes. All possible items and feats usable though. The class in question would be rogue.

Thanks.

One of my players got a hold of a magical lamp that summons an efreet to grant 1 wish for the summoner. The player wished: "I wish to be invulnerable".

The idea behind the wish is that it will twist and pervade any wish made into a negative effect. (The lamp was bestowed on the player by a disguised, evil rakshasa)

I could use some advice as to how to accomlish this so that the wish will be mostly negative effect, without breaking the character to be totally unplayable.

Similiar to this is also one other of my players. This person also got a wish from an efreet (main storyline stuff), after freeing him from 7000 years of captivity, only to wish the efreet to be his slave ("I wish for you to be my slave"). The way I handled this was basicly give him a ring of djinni calling with the said efreet bound to it and have 24 hours / every other day as the per summon limit. The advice I need with this player, is how to machinate the efreet's espace from this captivity and inflict great pain for this treachery.

The player character did send the efreet to fetch one other player character from a faraway place, and during that time, the efreet asked that person to steal the ring and in return would grant this person everything he ever desires (the person fetched was neutral evil wizard). But besides this, I could really use some help on how to free this extremely powerful being from the clutches of a lvl 6 chaotic evil character.

note: the party is all evil aligned, from lawful evils to chaotic evils, and on lvl 6.

Thanks.