Mythrandyr's page

I have been having a debate with a fellow player about what seems to me to be a missing rule.

I have a wizard/fighter that specializes in Conjuration with a subschool of teleportation. As such he gets Shift as a class feature - use a swift action to cast dimension door 10ft per shift. He also has the dimensional assault feat.

Pathfinder is all about simulating reality and if he is in combat with an opponent, uses shift as a swift action to shift behind or to the side of this opponent, and then attacks with the use of dimensional assault, shouldn't there be some sort of attack bonus?

If a person is in combat and doesn't know where an attack is coming from, for instance from an invisible player, they are denied dexterity bonus to armor class. Shouldn't this situation be similar?

Davor wrote:

See, I don't mind spending resources to succeed in melee, because, well, basically every class has to make that choice (every class that can, anyways). If a cleric want's to be successful in melee, he needs to sacrifice spells to do it. Same for a Bard, although the bard gets off a little easier with Inspire Courage. Basically, for a Magus, if you wanna hit hard in melee you have to choose to designate your resources towards doing so. Yeah, it kinda sucks, but the fact is that, if you choose to do so, you can focus on spellcasting and get a LOT of variety with your spell selection, and still be able to fight in melee in a pinch thanks to your various melee-augmenting abilities.

This class, to me, feel very much like a caster who uses his magic to augment his melee abilities almost EXCLUSIVELY, which is very much what I would expect from a class from Ultimate Magic.

What I am saying is there's not enough to sacrifice. I don't think all of the abilities buff the melee part enough. And if everything is spent on buffing the melee, there's not enough Pool for other abilities.

I think this can be solved by having more buff spells. I know most people like the damage spells, but I rather have buffs that lasts the entire encounter, not just 1 attack.

Where's Blink? Where's False Life? Where's Ghoul's Touch? Where's Darkvision? Where's HEROISM?!?!

If they gave Summoner Haste as a 2nd level spell, they can do the same with Magus, who is definitely suppose to fight, as opposed to Summoner, who can choose not to fight. Stoneskin should be level 3 also.

Aid is divine, but it would not be unreasonable for magus. Death Knell makes sense for evil magus. Freedom of Movement is on the bard list, but not on magus.

Not having divine spells makes some sense, although bard has divine spells on his list. But not having arcane melee help spells like Blink, Darkvision, Heroism especially, is just...lame.

I agree that the most of the buffs that a magus has access to through the use of his/her spell pool should last longer.

However, they do have Hasted Assault(su), which gives haste for a number of rounds equal to the magus's int bonus...

Thats no bad. However, as mentioned above I do believe that abilities such as Spell Shield and Arcane Accuracy should last longer. At 20th level, a magus with a intelligence of 30 will only have 20 spell pool points and to ask that player to sacrifice 5% of his/her daily allotment for 1 round of buffs is a little ridiculous - Then take into account abilities like Dispelling Strike and Reflection...

A magus would have to expend an enormous percentage of his/her spell points just to reflect one mid-level spell or dispel one mid-level spell on a target...

Thoughts?

LazarX wrote:

IkeDoe wrote:

I agree with Quandary, it was a problem I saw with the first version of the Magus.

Maybe I'm wrong and extensive playtesting proves me wrong, but IMO the class doesn't support high level Magi with high Dex (i.e. the Dex. 30 guy with a rapier), and it should.

Why? the high level magus is going to be busting it out with high level spells and arcana, and charging up his weapon with neat tricks. He doesn't need to be halfway duelist. Some nicely enchanted mithral breastplate would be my preference but the heavy armor is a nice option for those who want a more Dreadnought flavor to thier melee, and heavy armor also means heavy fortification is available.

The high str guy is doing the same and dealing even more damage.

The problem isn't the heavy armor ability, the problem is that it isn't an option, you just get it and it is mandatory to use it unless you want to be suboptimal for some reason.

Sure, for the high Dex guy using lighter armors means just a bit less AC, but far better speed and skill modifiers. However he is dealing less damage than the strong guy, are better Reflex saves and ranged touch attack bonuses worth it?

I totally agree. Especially when the PF description of a Max Dex bonus only applies to AC. If you read the player's guide, no other DEX based checks are effected.

So you can wear that heavy armor and withstand some decent melee, and in addition you can still add your full DEX bonus to ranged touch spells...

I have a player that's looking at a 50+ AC in his mid teens. (Pathfinder books ONLY, no splat) Paladin/Holy Vindicator/Stalwart Defender. Aside from Touch spells and Touch Attacks he'll be virtually unhittable by anything in the Bestiary. Most CR 20 foes will only hit him on a 15-17.

AC works just find, you just need to find a good target number to hit and build around it.

Finally some sanity. There are so many ways to increase AC. You have - Armor, Shield, Dex, Deflection, Natural Armor, Dodge, Sacred, Profane (cant use together), Insight, etc....

Also when players think that the PC's with the highest AC cant do any damage, you are forgetting - Weapon focus and Specialization feats, items that increase strength, choosing the right weapons, and once again feats in general - power attack, Cleave, Great Cleave, Critical Focus, Improved Critical, Bleeding Critical, Weapons of speed...

Be Creative...

I see where both sides are coming from.

However, with the PF rule-set a fighter can take a plethora of feats that can nullify a caster's ability to respond well in combat.

First to get in fast, they can charge.

But the feats Disruptive and Spellbreaker, make it much more difficult for casters to actually cast their spells when near a melee fighter. In addition the feats following critical focus, such as blinding critical and deafening critical also make casting with somatic components extremely difficult, especially when you cant see your target!

Check it:

Scimitar has a crit range of 18-20/X2. If you take improved crit, that becomes 15-20/X2. critical focus gives you a +4 to confirm those crits, and you only have to make a 15...

The above, in conjunction with the critical feats, makes a melee fighter extremely capable of taking on a spell caster. And this is even more the case, when at higher levels a fighter has magic items that make range a lesser issue - Moon bracers that allow dimensional step, boots of teleportation, helms of telekinesis...

So the argument that at higher levels mages are especially more powerful than fighters is false.

However, I will concede that in those late levels the power that mages can display is quite impressive - Meteor Swarm, Wish, Time Stop, Etc., the tactics are extremely different. As far as fighting general monsters/enemies, the fighter or monk (hell yeah monks are awesome...they have the will save that will push back against a lot of spells)are devastating to one opponent to several. while mages can devastate extremely large numbers of opponents.

Anyway I am rambling...I just think that if anyone feels that they are of equal match to anyone of your level, regardless of class, they are not being creative enough with the tools that PF has provided...

Mythrandyr wrote:

Does anyone know if the published version thats coming out soon will fix this?

Jason has stated on numerous occasions that the spell list in the playtest document isn't the full, final version, but is a representative subset. I suspect the actual published spell list will be beefier. Plus, since the book is called "Ultimate Magic" and introduces a new class that uses magic, I would be shocked (shocked, I say!) if it doesn't include a whole bucket load of new spells that the Magus can access.

-Skeld

Okay, that makes total sense...just getting antsy. Ive rolled a few of them up trying to find ways to access more touch spells - scrolls, wands, etc. But its never worth the focus because it just adds an additional action to the goal of a dual melee/magic attack. This is especially so when the other option is to cast a different spell for FREE...wonder which decision im gonna make...

The Magus is a great class, however there are all but one touch spell in the the spell list to use with Spell Combat(ex) and Spellstrike(su).

As these are both very key abilities for the magus, I was disappointed...

Does anyone know if the published version thats coming out soon will fix this?

I don't know how everyone feels about the ultimate magic playtest but...

I think that the Magus class is amazing but for one huge flaw.
The spell list does not include enough touch-spells to truly capitalize on the class features that combine melee and spells into a two-weapon fighting form...

Anyone else find this disappointing?