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There is a passage on pg90 of GoLS defining the different way in which Companion and Familiar-type Vestigial Bond "pets" do skill levels, and it desperately needs an example or explanation:

Quote:
In addition, vestigial companions that function as animal companions, eidolons, or cohorts doesn’t gain skill ranks like standard creatures do; instead, they possess a number of skill ranks equal to their character level in a number of skills equal to its number of skill ranks per level (based upon its creature type or class level) plus its Intelligence modifier

Animal companions have a -4 Intelligence Modifier, so does that mean that a Spirit that provides an Animal companion (as a Druid) has no skills until 5th level, when the Druid's Companion would have 5 skill points, at which point, the Pactmaker's Companion would have 1 skill with 5 ranks in it?

As an example, a second level Pactmaker with Sevnoir can have a Dog animal companion, as though they were a L2 Druid. Would this companion have:

  • 2 (druid level) ranks in 3 (the number of Skill Ranks in the animal companion table at L2) skills with a -4 (int mod) on each of their final values
  • 2 (druid level) ranks of skill in 0 (the 3 skills in the table -4 from the Int mod) skills
  • 2 (druid level) ranks in (2+IntMod, min 1 -- the per HD skills for the Animal type) skills (with an Int Mod penalty on it?)

As a (semi-) related question, the Binder Secret "Spirit Imp Familiar" says that you gain a Spirit Imp as though they were a wizard, which would grant it the Share Spells ability (which is useless because Pactmakers don't cast spells), but if a Bound Spirit grants a familiar as a Vestigial Bond, THAT familiar also would have Share Granted Abilities. Does a Spirit Imp Familiar (via the Binder Secret) get that or not, since it is not being provided by a pact?


Hey, last night I gave my son his WotR Base Set and it seemed to missing the pack of cards that included Monsters. Hard to say if other cards are missing, but monsters are most definately almost completely absent.

What are my options?

M


Yonks ago, I remember coming across an application that let you create random generation tables (meant for things like treasure trove contents, random names, "who is sitting at the end of the bar" questions, and s forth), then roll against them in a batch-based automated fashion. I recall that some industrious someone had used them to automate the bewilderingly complex yet awesome lifepath generation system found in the long lamented Central Castings "Heroes Of ...." books.

Anyone remember that application or anything like it? I dig lifepath systems, but they can be SO time consuming to use...


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So I had an idea for a project that I wanted to write, and wanted to see if this was an appropriate place to do it... I have subscribed to the Iron Gods path, but because of reasons, I am unlikely to be able to actually play it, though that is not to say that I can not enjoy it.

So, what I propose is the post a series of correspondences between Surrah Silvermane and her Mentor\Godfather, Malichi Ashenharp, as she makes her way through the Adventure Path.

So, assuming that this is an acceptable place for such a project, I am hoping to begin -- I didn't see a forum dedicated to Play-by-post here, and part of me is hoping that those who are on-the-fence about the Path might like to read these correspondences and get a feel for the series in a more voyeuristic way than simply a novelization.

If there is a better place for this sort of thing, please let me know, and I will ask for a move of the thread.


1 person marked this as FAQ candidate.

So the Save on Control Winds says Fort Negates, which is fine, but when you look up the effects of various wind speeds, they have their OWN save numbers - specifically for the "blown away" effect. Those saves are ludicrously low compared to the Fort Save that a caster of sufficient level to even use the spell is going to have.

So, the question is, what is the Fort Save from the SPELL encompassing? I think a strict interpretation would be that if you make the Fort save, you are entirely unaffected by the effect of the spell - wind. If that were the case, you could shoot an arrow through a tornado without issues, which seems silly. If you were to fail the safe, and thus be buffeted by winds conceivably in the hundreds of MPH that tear up trees, its only a DC10 Strength check to walk against the wind (if you're large) and only a DC 15 check for Medium creatures to not get blown away, when the Fort save could easily be MUCH higher.

I hasten to add that I am not advocating a more "simulationist" set of rules regarding the effects of high winds, but simply clarification on if a spell's save DC should have some effect on the underlying effect DCs?

I would argue (and to my DM's chagrin, probably will) that the DCs listed under the Wind Speeds Environment entry are detailing naturally occurring weather (thus unmanipulated by magic), and that they should be amped up based on the power of the magic effecting them - IE, modified by the caster's Wisdom modifier...


So my team - generally all around 15th level - and I are trying to sneak into a formerly drow citadel in order to snap off the big climactic battle and save the world. A frontal assault is not an option, and it occurred to me that this is a perfect opportunity to use my Druid's Animal Shapes spell. turning into a group of Bats might be a good, inconspicuous option, but I was wondering if there were any small or medium magical beasts that are able to burrow in stone? I've never really had much call for magical beasts in my experience playing this druid, so my normal roster of forms is lacking.

A pitty I can't use Vermin shapes. Spiders would be ideal.


Will there be\has there been some information released on how to create your own character? He card-shaped format is really only for consistency in a physical sense. I don't suppose it would be too hard to isolate what is a racial feature and what is a class feature and create new race\class combos... say I wanted to play a Halfling rogue instead of Mirisiel, for instance. I could isolate out the "elf-ness" in what is on Mirisiel's cards, and combine what is left with the "halfling-ness" of Lem...

Clearly, Paizo wants to stick with the Iconics, and that's awesome, but there's always going to be someone who is going to want to try something different.


Would the winds created by Control Winds effect things within the confines of an AMF? I'm of two minds. On the one hand, the magic effect is the increase or decrease of wind speed and direction, not the wind itself, plus the AMF would do nothing to stop all the debris and projectiles carried by the wind. On the other hand, it suppresses all magic in its area, so the "energy" that is directing\enhancing the wind would be suppressed.

thoughts?


So my son is a very bright 10 year old, and loves Pathfinder... we've been playing stuff from the Beginner Box, and that's been great, but he's ready for something a bit more weighty and with more options. the only Adventure Path I have is RotRL (Anniversary edition) with is a great series, but is quite grim and gruesome.

I was wondering if there was an adventure path which would be, content-wise, slightly less challenging for a group of young players?


I think I might already understand this, but wanted to ask the Meta-Mind anyhow. Take a Leonal, and add a couple levels of Ranger to him. Does this increase the "caster Level" of his Roar ability (which functions as Holy Word) or is that tied specifically to racial Hit Dice?

Spell-Like abilities as well, when you add class-levels to a creature, but not CASTER classes (though a ranger is a semi-caster, but I'm not sure if that's really relevant), is the caster level of Spell-like abilities bumped up? Again, in this example, the Leonal's Spell-like abilities are defined in their stat-block as CL14, and they (coincidentally) have 14 HD. Because the CL of those abilities is stated, it is a fixed value, even if that fixed value happens to be the same as its HD, so adding Class-level HD should not effect it... correct?


According to the Bestiary 2, all Agathions can lay on hands as a Paladin of a level equal to their Hit Dice... Having said that, Paladins of over third level add Mercies to their Lay On hands.

Pardon the pun, but on the one hand, Mercy is a separate class feature than Lay on Hands, but on the other, it an automatic additive to Lay on Hands, based on the Paladin's Level.

In fact, at the end of the write-up for Mercy, it says specifically that mercies are a direct and cumulative feature based on the level of the Paladin's Lay on Hands ability...

Opinions?


So... Aboleth's Lung (from ARG):

"The targets are able to breathe water, freely. However, they can no longer breathe air. Divide the duration evenly among all the creatures you touch. This spell has no effect on creatures that can already breathe water."

"they can no loner breathe air" -- so, when cast on, say, a bunch of Orcs in a forest, its a touch attack, will save, SR yes suffocation attack? Targets is "living" creature touched (not "willing"), and you can divide it among multiple targets, with a duration in the hours.

Sounds like a really awesome save-or-die for a second level spell....


So I've just gotten my Druid to 15th level, which is great, but over the past several levels I have begun to notice a significant issue with druid spells... many of them rely on Poison, Electricity, and poison, especially the high-level funtimes like Creeping Doom and the other swarm spells. People on the boards seem to love these spells, but the fact is, by the time you are at a level where you can cast it, it unusual for the target of your spells to not be immune to poison, fire, electricity, or acid, rendering a surprising amount of spells utterly impotent. IMHO, a 15th level character SHOULD be facing off against extraplanar issues, which takes Creeping Doom from being "OMG teh AWESOME" to a minor annoyance.

Is this just the way of things, or have I once again missed something?

Granted, I can still turn into an elder elemental and squish many many things, so perhaps I'm just b!#@@ing....


So bleed damage does not stack, and it takes an action to stop, but even a relatively massive 2d6 bleed does not strike me as worth a feat or spell slot when most monsters rarely last over 5 rounds of combat. Aren't there better ways to take out a badguy than bleed them?

Perhaps I am missing something, but I never saw the real advantage to getting Bleed... it seems circumstantially useful at best.


OK, so I am putting some Glyphs of Warding on a trapped object in a dungeon, protected by a 7th level Witch. The Glyph triggers Vomit Swarm, which creates a 7-round long large swarm of wasps.

According to the Trap calculator, the CR of a Magical Trap is either based on the level of the spell, or how much damage it does, whichever gives you a higher CR. A Wasp Swarm does 2d6 damage (poison is irrelevant here) and lasts for 7 rounds, and is an area-effect. So 2d6 = 7HP per round, *7 rds = 49HP, rounded to the nearest 10 = 50, doubled for being AoE = 100HP/10HP blocks = 10, so CR = 1+10 = 11?

CR 11 for a trap that summons a CR3 creature? That does not seem right. Am I screwing up my math?


Is there a quick-add template to add Shadowy-ness to a creature? I'm going to be converting the Scales of War path to Pathfinder, and there is a lot of Evil-Dark-Bad creatures in it. Templatizing seems like a good idea.

I didn't take a look at the ARG playtest, I admit, in case this had already been covered there. I'm thinking Cold and Electricity resistance, Darkness 1/day as a SLA, and Shadow-blending?


I'm not sure if WS still engenders the same knee-jerk nausea that it did with 3.5, but with the tremendous and, frankly, deserved nerfing Pathfinder put down on Wild Shape, it strikes me as a niche that could be carefully and equitably filled.

My idea is to construct a Spell akin to Enhance Wildshape, or alternatively, a set of Feats that would add additional chains of "Form of the" spells to a Druid's wildshape repertoire.

I would hazard a guess that I can not be the first person to think of this, but I have not been able to find one myself.

The idea is that I see no "flavor" reason why a Druid could not Wildshape into Vermin, for instance. Having a feat or Spell (which essentially would read "The next time the Caster uses their Wild Shape class ability...") that would add an additional sentence to the Wild Shape entry under Druid, stating that a Druid of at least 6th level can take the form of Small or Medium creatures of the Vermin type, as per Vermin Shape 1, and Druids of at least 8th level can take the shape of Tiny or large creatures of the Vermin type as per Vermin Shape 2.

I am purposefully delaying the effect of this ability to 1 level past where the Druid can use the spells directly, as an off-set of the advantages that Wild Shape has over mere Spell casting.

Does this seem reasonable?


More of an opinion thing, I guess, but with the proliferation of Archetypes, I'm a bit concerned about an unintended consequence that I really don't yet have a name for.

With Prestige classes (the most obvious comparison), when one is published, as a player, you can say to yourself "wow, that's really cool, and I never thought about it, but what a great fit for my PC!" With a bit of retraining, and some storytelling, you can pick up that Prestige class for that PC, and add some desired coolness to your PC.

I do not think that there are yet any "rules" about anything like retraining into an Archetype. For instance, there sounds to be a number of really cool archetypes coming in Ultimate magic, and I daresay in Ultimate Combat, but if you've been slogging your way from first to 12th level, and suddenly there is a Bard archetype that totally fits your concept, you have no "canonical" way to pick it up...

How would you, as a GM, adjudicate this? There are serious retcon issues that could come up with Archetype retraining, for instance a Rogue suddenly forgetting how to find traps seems a bit far-fetched... BUT, we as GM's have "magic" to rely on to explain that away.

for instance, a Magic Item (perhaps created along the lines of a Golem Manual in cost and creation), that would enable the reader to re-spec a class as a new Archetype? To me that seems like a reasonable option, but is that a can of worms, and how would you adjudicate it? Is re-speccing to take on an archetype something that could be allowed more than once for a multiclass PC?

I can predict that there would be a number of issues, mechanically, with this, but it seems to me that the inability to take on an Archetype later in a PC's career is going to frustrate more players than it helps.


OK, my new Druid character is helping the rest of the party defend against an almost limitless horde of undead, making a final majestic stand against the BBEG et cetera et cetera. So, being undead, I'm not going to bother with things that target fortitude, or poision effects, because they are pretty much immune.

However...

Control Winds has a "Fortitude Negates" save, which normally would mean that Undead are immune, EXCEPT, that undead are explicitly effected by any spell (with a Fortitude save) that would effect an Object, such as Disintegrate. Wind Effects specifically effect objects, namely, trees, buildings, and other structures.

So would a hurricane-force Control Wind in an Updraft setting just pile all the undead in its area into a neat column, just begging for a Flame Strike, with no save?

Combine that with an area-effect damage spell like Blistering Radiance, Vortex of Teeth, or even Blade Barrier, and its hard to see how this can't end badly for them, stuck as they will be in a giant slurry-maker....

Edit: I may have just found my answer, in that they do get a Fort Save, but the modifier is based on CHA instead of CON.


The simple Templates - specifically, the Celestial one - do not put any restrictions on what it can be placed on. Does that mean that you could have Celestial or Infernal Elementals or Plants, for instance?


With the release of the (play-test versions of the) Ninja, samurai, and Gunfighter, what sort of in-game justification, if any, would you require for a PC to re-train (in essence) from Rogue to Ninja, retroactively.

You can't multi-class Rogue\Ninja or Cavalier\Samurai for instance, but if the new sub-class was kinda what the PC was trying to accomplish from the get-go, how far would you force hem to go in-story to justify what would be a pretty radical rebuilding?

Its admittedly setting-dependent to a HUGE degree, but would, for example, having adventured with a pair of Monks for a long time be sufficient for a Rogue to sort of go through a retraining montage and emerge a Ninja? they're not that far apart (as opposed to Fighter\ Gunfighter, for instance that are WORLDS apart).

I would hope that Ultimate Combat would give some guidelines\pseudo-crunchies to accommodate those kinds of transitions, but I'm curious as to how the community feels?