First of all, thanks for all the quick responses! This at least gives me an idea of what's involved.

Pad300, I had seen the gem of seeing in the core rulebook, but as it was 5 minutes per use and slotless it was just too far off from what I was looking for. I like the idea for a lesser gem of seeing, except I want to use a slot for the item (maybe a ring). I read in the core rulebook that an item that does not take up one of the spaces on a body costs double, so does that mean I should cut the price you came up with in half to make a 'ring of seeing'?

Also, I'm still seeing quite a wide range of prices (80850 gp, 41000 gp, 18750 gp), I'm wondering if maybe I could get a tighter concensus as to the cost? Thanks again for everyone's help, pricing something like this is obviously not simple!

I was hoping to get a price on a magic item that would allow for casting true seeing a limited number of times per day, each use lasting 1 minute (I'm expecting to use it almost exclusively for combat, more than a minute per use is probably just wasted).

Depending on the price, 10 times per day would be fantastic, 3 times per day probably more realistic, once per day is my worst case option. I know true seeing is a 5th level cleric spell and the caster level would be 9th, but I can't get much farther than that - the item creation rules are kinda hard for me to figure out! Any ideas?

Lunge is great for getting around attacks of opportunity if you want to attempt a combat maneuver without the usual feat...

Lunge feat a little OP

Yeah, I would have to agree that an opponent with uncanny dodge would not lose their dex bonus to AC due to being blinded. But they would still have the blinded condition, and (I think) not be precisely aware of what's going on - so someone could still attempt an action that would ordinarily provoke an AoO and get away with it.

Of course, if your opponent has the blind-fight feat, or worse yet blindsense or blindsight (from the Pathfinder Bestiary, pg. 298), that changes everything.

Also - how does the Demoralize option of the Intimidate skill interact with causing a shaken condition using the Dirty Trick combat maneuver? Or with the 'rattling strike' hunter's trick from the skirmisher ranger archetype?:

Pg. 321 of the Advanced Player's Guide, under 'Dirty Trick':

"If your attack is successful, the target takes a penalty.
The penalty is limited to one of the following conditions:
blinded, dazzled, deafened, entangled, shaken, or
sickened."

Pg. 128 of the Advanced Player's Guide, under 'Hunter's Tricks' of the Skirmisher Archetype for the Ranger Class:

"Rattling Strike (Ex): The ranger can use this trick as a
free action before he makes a melee attack. If the attack
hits, the target is shaken for 1d4 rounds."

Is it possible to use two dirty tricks in a row to cause an opponent to become frightened? Can you use two rattling strikes in a row to do likewise? Can someone perform a rattling strike and then follow it up the next turn with a dirty trick to cause the opponent to take on the frightened condition?

Really the only dirty trick condition that would apply is blinded:

Say you blind an opponent with a dirty trick combat maneuver, would that mean another member of your party could attempt something that would ordinarily provoke an AoO?

I guess what I'm really asking is whether the blinded condition would prevent someone from making attacks of opportunity. If my character could blind an opponent (for one round) then shouldn't another ally acting while the opponent is still blinded be able to attempt a disarm, trip or even leave a square threatened by only that opponent without provoking an attack of opportunity?

If so, dirty trick could be a great teamwork feat - that one round that the opponent can't make attacks of opportunity would allow allies to move into flanking position, disarm, trip, you name it - all without the 'improved ______' feats.

From the Advanced Player's Guide, pg. 128, under Hunter's Tricks:

"A ranger cannot select an individual trick more than once."

This may seem like roundabout reasoning, but it appears to me this statement would be unnecessary if the total uses of all the hunter's tricks were equal to x = "a total number of times per day equal to 1/2 his ranger level + his Wisdom modifier". It's only when each hunter's trick can be used x times per day that there would be any point to choosing a trick more than once.

Of course, my character is a ranger so I'm a little biased!

If he attempts an upending strike he of course is not subject to an attack of opportunity from his opponent.

Why not?

Damn! You're right - I thought the wording of 'upending strike' allowed for the ranger to make a trip attack without provoking an attack of opportunity, but that's not necessarily the case. I guess I have a new question now...

Thanks for the answer on the AoO chain - that makes sense now.

Not sure if this particular issue has already been addressed so I figured I'd just ask:

I have a Dwarven Ranger with the Skirmisher archetype from the Advanced Player's Guide (pg. 128). He has the 'upending strike' hunter's trick:

"Upending Strike (Ex): The ranger can use this trick as a free
action just before he makes a melee attack. If the attack hits,
he may make a free trip combat maneuver against the target."

The ranger has neither the improved trip feat nor the improved disarm feat. If he attempts an upending strike he of course is not subject to an attack of opportunity from his opponent. If the opponent is tripped and stands up from prone that provokes an attack of opportunity. My question:

If the ranger then attempts a disarm attack on his opponent as his attack of opportunity, does that then allow the opponent to attack the ranger, while the opponent is in the middle of standing up?

I know how the ordinary chain of attacks of opportunity works and that would allow for this, it just seems crazy that the opponent can whack at the ranger while he's also in the middle of getting up from prone!

Not sure if I'm reading this right, but it looks like the RAW allows soft cover to apply to combat maneuvers as well as ordinary attacks:

Pg. 199 of the Pathfinder Core Rulebook:

"A creature can also add any circumstance, deflection, dodge, insight, luck, morale, profane, and sacred bonuses to AC to its CMD. Any penalties to a creature’s AC also apply to its CMD."

Pg. 196:

"Soft Cover: Creatures, even your enemies, can provide you with cover against ranged attacks, giving you a +4 bonus to AC. However, such soft cover provides no bonus on Reflex saves, nor does soft cover allow you to make a Stealth check."

So someone attacking with a reach weapon thru a square occupied by a friendly is at an additional -4 to hit whether it's an ordinary attack or a combat maneuver.

Well, as for me personally, the only three combat maneuvers I could imagine working this way with lunge are the ones I've listed - disarm, trip and dirty trick.

I don't see how you could possibly lunge and grapple someone - that would mean that at the end of your attack you have actually moved another 5 feet somehow, not just lunged. Likewise, it would be great to use lunge with bullrush, charge, overrun, drag or reposition, but it seems to me that it doesn't make sense with any of those options.

So I agree with what you're saying about grapple, as well as most of the combat maneuvers - I feel like you have to be right up on someone to grapple them, or drag or reposition, etc., so I'm not expecting to even try to use those with lunge. But disarm, trip and dirty trick? They actually make sense to me - a quick intrusion into the opponent's threatened square and then right back out would allow for those.

Check this out:

Does Lunge Make You Immune to AoOs?

I'm definitely no rules expert, and I am *not* telling anyone how to run their own game, but the consensus seems to indicate that lunge makes you 'immune' to AoO's. I do kind of like the idea of allowing a sunder or disarm AoO - that at least makes sense, but it's not actually in the rules as written. By RAW, lunge seems to allow you to bypass the AoO provoked by attempting a disarm, trip or dirty trick.

I realize this thread is pretty old but I'm seriously looking into getting lunge for my dwarven ranger character and I realized there are at least 3 combat maneuvers it works fantastic with:

Disarm
Trip
Dirty Trick (from the Advanced Player's Guide)

All of these provoke an attack of opportunity if you don't have the appropriate 'Improved...' feat, which of course has the prerequisite of the combat expertise feat. So if I want to be a disarm specialist I can take the combat expertise feat now, and then wait two more levels until my next feat so I can finally take improved disarm as well. Likewise with trip or dirty trick. Or...I could take lunge and allow myself to do all three without subjecting myself to an AoO.

Of course, you don't get the +2 to the maneuver that the 'Improved...' feat provides, but the really big advantage is in avoiding the AoO. You still technically provoke an AoO, but if you lunge in and out to do the disarm, trip or dirty trick, you can remain out of the threat range of your (medium-sized) opponent, so they can't attack you. In my case the dwarven ranger has giants as his favored enemy and he'll be attacking with a reach weapon (a ranseur, +2 to disarm) - same difference! So with one feat (lunge) the ranger can attempt a disarm, a trip or a dirty trick, all without subjecting himself to an AoO. From my standpoint this is the primary reason lunge is a fantastic feat.

I have a creative situation that I want opinions on - I believe that the pathfinder rules would allow for this but you guys tell me what you think:

My dwarven ranger has an intelligent item (his armor) that can cast unseen servant - it's pretty much on all day long since the armor can cast it 3 times per day and it lasts 6 hours per casting (armor is +2 enhanced so its caster level is 6th). My idea is that the unseen servant can be commanded by the intelligent armor to sweep up a weapon that has *just* been disarmed by the ranger. The armor acts on the same turn as the ranger as we play it now - the armor can just ready its action so that as soon as the dwarf disarms someone the unseen servant can drag the weapon away before the opponent gets a chance to even try and pick it up (of course, the US can only drag it 15 feet). Does this make sense to you guys? Should the dwarf be allowed to disarm someone and then let the US sweep the weapon up immediately after?

Thanks for any and all input - the more comments the better!

Thanks for the answers guys, you confirmed what I was 99% sure of. And yes, mithral full plate *is* expensive, but he's buying (and now sleeping in) it!

This might seem like a simple question but it's one I'm very interested in the answer to! I'm a complete newbie to Pathfinder, creating a dwarven ranger PC at 8th level (the group I'll be a part of is 8th level). I'm getting him heavy armor proficiency specifically so he can wear mithral full plate armor. He'll also gain 'Endurance' as a bonus feat at 3rd level for a ranger.

The description for 'Endurance' states:

You may sleep in light or medium armor without becoming fatigued.

Normal: A character without this feat who sleeps in medium or heavier armor is fatigued the next day.

Also, concerning Mithral:

Most mithral armors are one category lighter than normal for purposes of movement and other limitations. Heavy armors are treated as medium, and medium armors are treated as light, but light armors are still treated as light. This decrease does not apply to proficiency in wearing the armor. A character wearing mithral full plate must be proficient in wearing heavy armor to avoid adding the armor’s check penalty to all his attack rolls and skill checks that involve moving.

So, any character with the 'Endurance' feat wearing a suit of mithral full plate armor should be able to sleep in the armor without becoming fatigued, correct? Thanks in advance for any answers or comments!

Thanks for all the quick replies - one thing I forgot to mention: my ranger is a dwarf, so the speed penalties don't apply to him.

So, at least at the base level of rhino hide (+2 AC bonus), for a dwarven PC rhino hide would actually be equivalent to a mithral breastplate for purposes of AC, armor check penalty and base movement. But I also get the lagniappe of +2d6 if I ever get to charge (not sure how often that'll come in handy).

I should point out though, the rhino hide already has a +2 magic enhancement, so the most I could add to it would be another +3 to AC (for a total of +5, just like any armor). And I'm guessing that next step up from +2 to +3 would cost 9000 - 4000 = 5000 gp, not just 1000 gp as it would to get a mithral breastplate to a +1 magic enhancement bonus.

I've got another newbie question for you guys - I'm about to start playing pathfinder with a group of level 8 PC's and I'm looking to outfit my ranger character. I'm not willing to spend a feat (or take a dip into fighter) yet on heavy armor proficiency, so I had been looking at a mithral breastplate as the best armor choice for him. As I understand it, a mithral breastplate would give a +6 armor class bonus and would only have a -1 armor check penalty. But then I saw rhino hide in the magic items section of the core rulebook:

Rhino Hide
Aura moderate transmutation; CL 9th
Slot armor; Price 5,165 gp; Weight 25 lbs.
Description
This +2 hide armor is made from rhinoceros hide. In addition
to granting a +2 enhancement bonus to AC, it has a –1 armor
check penalty and deals an additional 2d6 points of damage on
any successful charge attack made by the wearer, including a
mounted charge.
Construction
Requirements Craft Magic Arms and Armor, bull’s strength; Cost
2,665 gp

So it looks as though rhino hide would have a +6 armor class bonus (same as a breastplate). What I'm unclear on is the armor check penalty. Is the rulebook stating that the armor check penalty is only -1 (as for a mithral breastplate), or do they mean it would be one less than for typical hide armor (-3 for hide armor would be reduced to -2)? If they're saying rhino hide actually has only a -1 armor check penalty, it seems to be just as good as a mithral breastplate, but really better because it has the added bonus of +2d6 damage if you charge! So which is it? Thanks in advance for your help!

he is not bumping the dwarven war axe (an exotic weapon) though, he is bumping the great axe, a martial weapon and making it exotic... which seems to fall right in line with how it should be done, if you are into doing such a thing.

Yeah, that's pretty much what I was interested in. And after reading through all of the varied perspectives in this thread, I think I know why a two-handed dwarven waraxe was not supplied in the Pathfinder core rulebook - because dwarves already get one fantastic one-handed weapon.

I'm not interested in using a double weapon so I haven't really thought about the pros or cons of the urgrosh, but I know for sure that the dwarven waraxe as it stands now is a pretty great one-handed weapon. Even though a two-handed version *could* exist in the dwarven fantasy world, actually making such a weapon available in the game would be sort of an unfair advantage for a PC choosing the dwarven race (assuming its stats were clearly better than a greataxe as the dwarven waraxe is better than a battleaxe). So in the interest of game balance, a two-handed version of the dwarven waraxe is not listed in table 6-4, and rightfully so.

But after Daniel Moyer pointed out the 'Earthbreaker' to me, my interest in creating a two-handed dwarven waraxe is a moot point:

-------------------------------------------------------------------
Two-Handed Melee Weapon
Earthbreaker - 40gp/ 1d10(s)/ 2d6(m)/ ×3/ 14lb./ Bludgeoning
-------------------------------------------------------------------

The Earthbreaker meets all your specifications(I think) and is in the rules already... Dwarf-like flavor/style(2-handed warhammer in a sense), 2d6 damage, x3 crit like an Axe, 2-handed WITHOUT being a Greatsword, non-exotic.

This is just what I was looking for - better actually, because my ranger is going to have undead as his first favored enemy, and a blunt weapon will work great against skeletons and liches! Also, the whole 2-handed warhammer idea fits perfectly with a dwarven character - thanks for the heads-up Daniel!

Thanks especially to everyone who chimed in on this thread - like I said before, this was exactly the kind of discussion I was hoping for. Thank the ancestors for messageboards

Thanks for all your input guys - this is exactly the sort of discussion I was hoping for - everyone has different viewpoints, all of them valid.

Vuron, you illuminated the whole idea very well for me, but I think 3d6 damage would be significantly overpowered - the damage Majuba mentioned (1d14 or 2d6, keeping the x3 crit) is pretty much what I was aiming at (with no minus to hit). That way I (as a dwarf) could have a unique two-handed weapon that isn't necessarily superior to a greatsword, and yet because it's exotic, not everyone in the game is going to spend a feat to use it. I just wanted an alternative to avoid jumping on the greatsword bandwagon (highest average for non-crit damage among two-handed weapons) like a lot of PC's do.

Hi guys - I'm a complete newbie to Pathfinder, creating a dwarven ranger PC at 8th level (the group I'll be a part of is 8th level). Like most people, I want to create something slightly different - at the very least for variety's sake.

I was wondering if anyone had any ideas on why there is no two-handed version of a dwarven waraxe? I'm aware you can just make a large version (one-handed becomes two-handed, -2 on attack roll, 1d10 damage moves up to 2d8), but I was interested in what everyone's opinion of the stats for a real two-handed dwarven waraxe would be (without the -2 to hit). Of course, damage of 1d12 would just make it a greataxe, so that's kind of pointless, and damage of 2d8 with no -2 penalty is unbalanced - any opinions?

I tried searching through the messageboards myself but couldn't find any mention of this idea - thanks for any and all input!