Morbius X's page

Morbius X wrote:

Evil Midnight Lurker wrote:

...I hate to be the negative nelly, but this is giving me screaming flashbacks to 3.5's MM 4 and 5, which absolutely none of the gamers in my group liked, and which turned out to be the harbingers of 4th Edition.

With the Strategy Guide and now this, I am kinda scared too. But they're going so strong, I think Paizo is just taking a break and doing simple things before bringing out more goodies later.

I'm seeing it differently.

The game has been going strong for 5 years. A lot of rules. I know many complain of rules bloat. I read that one of Paizo's approach to D&D Next is not to directly compete - if next brings in a bunch of new players, and some of them want something else, they will move to Pathfinder. These books are a great place to start for people just getting into the game - and while many of us have been playing for a very long time, these kind of things are very good for start up players.
I think it is looking at the long term, and helping bring new players into Pathfinder, rather than end of life cycle products. Sort of a "we've been around a while, lets set up stuff for new players so we can keep going" rather than "we've run out of ideas".

This makes sense and is sound in logic. I mean, they still have their MMO coming out I think and they do need to make things easier for new players as well as veterans. They have plenty of goodies to come.

...I hate to be the negative nelly, but this is giving me screaming flashbacks to 3.5's MM 4 and 5, which absolutely none of the gamers in my group liked, and which turned out to be the harbingers of 4th Edition.

With the Strategy Guide and now this, I am kinda scared too. But they're going so strong, I think Paizo is just taking a break and doing simple things before bringing out more goodies later.

This. This is wonderful idea. How do you fight the inevitable monster bloat?

Um, there is no such thing as "monster bloat" in any RPG.

I for one am a bit disappointed in no Bestiary 5 but I guess we'll see what comes in 2015.

I am looking over Downtime section in Ultimate Campaign and I cannot make heads nor tails over the PHASE 1 of Downtime. Here is the line:

"Phase 1—Upkeep: Pay costs associated with maintaining completed buildings and organizations."

Problem is I cannot find anywhere as to how much it costs to maintain buildings/organizations? How much does it cost?

What kind of combat options do we have in here? New rules and feats?

What levels of tech can we expect to find? I mean I have an idea considering there's plasma blasters and all, but are we also getting more fantasy renaissance gear along the lines of more goodies for the Gunslinger?

Still not happy with these being "hybrids" instead of "true classes." Any idea if these can still multiclass properly? (As in, I can have me an Arcanist/Sorcerer or Investigator/Rogue if I wanted?)

All this cool stuff is supposed to fit within 64 pages...? I feel like we need twice that amount.

The monstrous mount feat is awesome.

And it's awesome because it does.....?

I cannot find anywhere in D&D or Pathfinder on vampires being able to simply have more than one coffin.

Are they attuned to only one coffin (and must attune to a new if it is destroyed) or can they simply avoid death and spread out a bunch of them to fly to when killed? (which would make almost any vampire extremely difficult to end)

What's the official word?

Anyone ever seen or read "Trigun"? A manga/anime series? It talks about this very balance. The main villain poses a question when the main character sees a butterfly trapped in a spider web.

"Go ahead and save the butterfly, but now you just killed the spider because it has no food to eat. Let the spider live, but now the butterfly dies."

That's a paraphrase, but you get the point. A neutral character would be the one to make sure all the spiders don't die or that all the butterflies won't die. Now which spider and which butterfly lives, that is an interesting topic for those espousing to keep the balance.

If you want to take it into the modern world, there are people who specialize in maximizing the "compromise" between parties. I would consider these people True Neutral or Lawful Neutral in a sense because they assure both parties are not wiping the other out, but agreeing to take some good with the bad in order to keep the balance of "peace".

If anything, neutrality is a wonderful alignment for deep roleplay. Only people who are used to thinking in black&white terms fail to understand its concepts.

zergtitan wrote:

What are the new grit feats?

In addition to the one I already mentioned above (Gun Twirling), there's also a new grit feat that gives you a new way to regain grit: by lying to your enemies! Whenever you successfully lie to someone using the Bluff skill, you regain a point of grit. It doesn't work on allies or on creatures with less than half your Hit Dice, but its pretty neat!

The other grit feat is called Named Bullet, which allows you to scribe a foe's name onto a bullet you create with Gunsmithing, granting the bullet the bane property against that foe. Crafting the bullet costs 1 grit and lowers your maximum pool by 1 point until you use the bullet.

Hm I coulda swore I saw something just like Named Bullet in one of the 3rd party Gunslinger products I have seen.

Mechalibur wrote:

Huh, that looks pretty cool. It actually doesn't even seem that overpowered to me, especially since it's a 1/day capstone.

My big issue is it's essentially not just one but two 9th level spells, one arcane only and the other divine only (domains, mysteries, and bloodlines aside) that a 15th level character can have access to. A Wizard 5/Envoy of Balance 10 with both Power Word Kill and True Resurrection (with no material component!) as once per days kind of pushes things for me a bit.

Not egregiously so, but a bit much.

And as far as the traps, all four new ones are based around adding an alchemical item into the trap so you basically spew its effects over a 10-ft. radius. Firework Trap, Limning Trap (nonmagical Glitterdust, essentially), Smoke Trap, and Noxious Fumes Trap.

You do realize it takes someone to go out their way to make a level 1 character, role play properly, and then take it all the way to 15 for this to even happen right? This is only an issue if the GM actually enjoys running games with min-maxers or lets min-maxers practically run his game for him.

So Weapon Training gives you Weapon Focus for a chosen weapon.

Combat Trick gives you a bonus Combat Feat. Weapon Focus is a Combat Feat.

So exactly why are they both there? It makes no sense.

Can the designers errata Weapon Training to make it more useful to take? Such as Weapon Training "grants proficiency and Weapon Focus with a chosen weapon"?

Anyone else house rule it this way to make Weapon Training an actual talent worth taking?

I have a player that is playing a Knight/Cleric for our games and he wants to get some shield feats for his character. Unfortunately, many of the feats he is interested in requires him to have Two Weapon Fighting.

Why is that? Dexterity is usually a dump stat, and it is for him (Dex 10) but it locks him out some cool shield feats now :(

What do the new feats do other than Dirty Trick Master and Unusual Origin?

Oh, I wonder if they will include new deeds for Gunslingers.

I, too, am hoping for more Gunslinger material. They are so scarce in Paizo Pathfinder material, I wish they would give more love to this class. Even the Magus gets more love. It's upsetting for them to favor something more "traditional" all the time.

Actually, there is no reason multiclassing still can't work. When I look over what, say, a Ranger 10/Slayer 10 has, there are no overlaps of abilities. Unless you take Slayer talents like Favored Terrain, but I would simply rule them separately and you obviously can't take the same terrain twice (so a Ranger 10 has 2 Favored Terrains at +4 and +2 and a Slayer 10 would have 5 if he chose all 5 at +10, +8, +6, +4, +2).

I don't agree with these "classes" not being able to multiclass with the "parent" class. And who says these are not Alternate Classes? Clearly they are.

I allow the Ninja/Rogue in my games and it works out just fine. To find an in-game explanation for why a Ninja could not "learn the ways of the Rogue" really had no explanation at all.

The same with, say, Ranger/Slayer. What is it inherent about the Slayer that prevents him from having a deeping connection to the divine and gaining Ranger abilities? (spellcasting, animal companions, etc.)

Paizo made the mistake of calling this book "Advanced Class Guide" when it should have been called "Ultimate Alternate Classes" or "advanced Alternate Class Guide" because that's exactly what this.

If it hasn't popped up already, get read to see House Rules threads forming that allows multiclassing with theses "classes".

I am confused. What is rage cycling? I never heard of this, how does it work?

But apparently it's a unique double weapon, cause it states you wield the kamas as if wielding two weapons, not as if wielding a double weapon.

I think the "Double" property is the problem. Boy I sure wish this FAQ gets answered soon because I have a Ninja to DM and we want to work out the kinks with this weapon.

So it means I either spend my turn using it as two weapons or spend a turn using it only as a reach weapon?

I cannot switch between?

For example, I have 3 attacks at +11/+6/+1 and then an additional two off-hand attacks due to Improved Two Weapon Fighting. So on a full attack I have +9/+4/-1 and +9/+4 wielding the kamas in each hand.

If I choose to wield it as a reach weapon I only get +11/+6/+1, but all as Reach attacks?

If I can pick up a kama dropped as a free action why am I not allowed to simply make, say, two attacks as a Reach attack, pull the kama back to my hand as a free action, and make my final attack and secondary attacks as normal? Or any other such combination?

I don't understand one thing.

So you are considered to have concealment when successfully using Stealth? What for? If you use Stealth, your presence is not detected, then why does being considered to have concealment matter? You can't be targeted anyway because you are not detected. Who can attack you with a 20% miss chance if they can't even locate you cause they don't know you're there?

This weapon comprises a pair of kama connected with an 8-foot length of chain. The wielder can attack as if armed with a single kama in each hand or extend the chain to make a single reach attack. By swinging the rope, the wielder can whip the kama about to disarm or trip opponents. Furthermore, if one of the weapons is dropped, the wielder can retrieve as a free action by pulling on the chain.

I do not understand the description at all.

So, you fight with these as you would two weapons. I take it that it is no longer a reach weapon when you do this. Therefore, you can only attack adjacent and do not threaten at 10 ft.

But then it says "OR extend the chain to make a single reach attack".

Does that mean that if I choose to use the weapon as a reach weapon I can only make ONE attack? What if I have two or three attacks from having a high BAB? I can't use the Reach ability with a Full Attack?

Does this also mean I cannot use the weapon as a reach weapon and attack with both ends?

What's the point of such a weird ruling?

Can we get material on Law and Chaos too? I really dig that theme moreso than Good vs Evil which is extremely overdone.

I really dig the Inevitables. I hope Paizo can do something unique and new for once

I'm crossing my fingers for both Bestiary 4 and NPC Codex II this year, but it doesn't seem very likely.

Um they announced Bestiary 4 like a week ago. Supposedly a November/December release of this year.

Going through the dragons in the first Bestiary I noticed nothing stating certain dragons having access to Cleric spells as arcane spells to add to their spells known. Which I find quite silly, considering how dragons are known, and have always in D&D/d20 system, been envious of the great magic they have learned to harness and manipulate. Being able to use Cleric spells as arcane spells was a great representation of that.

What was the designers' reasons for taking that away? I feel as if the lethality and utilities of a true dragon have been taken away from them. Has anyone chosen to keep them around via keeping to 3.5 edition version?

I also noticed they gave them all extra dragon abilities, like the Bronze's vortex and wave mastery. I'd love to incorporate that into my games, but now they outshine the dragons from my 3.5 books like Monsters of Faerun, Draconomicon, and dragons in Dragon Magazine issues.

I have been searching over all my 3.0, 3.5, and Dragon Magazine issues for this one spell that works just like Modify Memory but it affects multiple targets.

I have Googled it a million different ways but to no avail, I cannot find the spell. I went through all my 3.0 and 3.5 Magazines and, I might have missed it, but I swore it was a Dragon Magazine spell and specific to a domain or deity.

I just don't know the name. It wasn't called "Modify Memory, Mass" or anything as such.

Can someone tell me where I can find the spell?

Do all constructs lose their immunity to mind-affecting effects if they have an Intelligence score? I assume yes.

Well here is the wording of it:

"A vindicator can channel energy into his shield as a standard action; when worn, the shield gives the vindicator a sacred bonus (if positive energy) or profane bonus (if negative energy) to his Armor Class equal to the number of dice of the vindicator's channel energy. This bonus lasts for 24 hours or until the vindicator is struck in combat, whichever comes first. The shield does not provide this bonus to any other wielder, but the vindicator does not need to be holding the shield for it to retain this power."

It says the shield gives a bonus to the AC, instead of something like "the vindicator receives a sacred bonus to his shield bonus" or something along those lines. Sounds to me like the sacred bonus from the shield would apply to CMD.

Do unnamed bonuses add to CMD? I see a particular list stating what types of bonuses do add to CMD, but I see nothing concerning unnamed bonuses.

Speaking of which, would the sacred bonus applied to your shield when using Vindicator's Shield also apply to CMD? Even though shield bonuses normally don't add to CMD?

I see. Ok. Then the way I ran the combat worked. One player had his character engulfed and while stuck inside, I had the gelatinous cube on its next turn move and try to engulf another foe. Just wanted to make sure that was legit.

crunch details where they at?

Lately I have been feeling that the skill point use in Pathfinder is really redundant. A lot of PCs are just high in Intelligence and good in the same set of skills (Acrobatics, Perception, Spellcraft, Stealth, UMD) and it is really boring.

It only gets interesting if PCs actually spend the points on Crafts, Professions, and Perform checks.

The problem is, a lot of these skills have limited uses. Maybe if Paizo continued to release new uses for the skills, there'd be reason to branch to skills hardly ever taken such as Climb, Swim etc. (especially the skills that are always overcome by low level magic such as Climb and Swim). Maybe if Perform could do things other than be only useful for Bards and make very little cash would help enhance gameplay.

Another interesting thing is I don't see why Paizo couldn't release a new set of rules similar to WotC's Skill Trick system introduced in Complete Scoundrel. The Skill Trick system was an awesome way to spend skill points for the PCs to perform 1/encounter tricks that were really useful when needed.

Something I think Paizo should consider, and should have considered long ago.

Scouring through the boards, FAQs, and Google on both D&D 3.5 and Pathfinder systems, I cannot find anything clarifying one important question about the ENGULF special attack.

Once a creature is engulfed, and stuck inside (in Pathfinder's case, the creature is pinned), can the creature continue its actions as normal? Can it continue to engulf more enemies if it can?

For example, I had 3 of my players face a Gelatinous Cube. It engulfed them, but captured only one. That player was pinned inside (and I assume it would only be able to escape if it escaped the pin and grapple versus the ooze's CMB?).

With the PC pinned inside, is the Gelatinous Cube able to take its actions normally such as move its speed and slam attack or try to even engulf more PCs?

I want to know what is in it before I consider purchasing. All the other product pages have people spilling contents all the time, I just wonder why so many are silent on this one?

What are the names of the archetypes, spells and feats?

Why this get pushed back? I see a lot of their products have questionable release dates. There's like 4 books coming out in June for instance. You need to fix it. I thought I was getting this book this week. Very upset now.

No one can say what is in the book? I only read a few things

What is all the new stuff in here?