Nildayre's page

In case y’all have missed it, a number of employees have just announced their intent to form a Paizo Workers Union. We should translate our frustration here into support for those workers getting the resources they need to avoid months like this happening in the future.

Due to inconsistent international shipping this is an extraordinarily large shipment month. Thank you for your patience and patronage. Paizo offices will reopen on Tuesday after the national holiday.

I understand that shipping has been bad, but, like, when you warn me ahead of time it’s a justification, when you tell me after the fact it’s an excuse. We’ve been asking what’s going on since Friday, and it wouldn’t have been hard to make a post at EOB saying “Hey, shipping is hard, our window has now extended to X Oct,” instead of just leaving us twisting in the wind.

I’ve got a nearly $200 order that still hasn’t cleared from “Pending” or charged to my account. The shipping window for honoring the 13 October release date is today. Am I going to get my products on time? It’s a little frustrating to subscribe to the Rulebooks, Lost Omens, Special Editions and Adventure Paths, and potentially not get my books before I could go buy them at a brick and mortar.

Ok, so I have a question about the Shadowcaster. They are described as using their main spell proficiency and ability score for their DOMAIN spells. Hey also have access to some of the Shadowdancer feats, to include Shadow Magic and its successors. Those feats describe the spells as FOCUS spells, and call out using the Occult proficiency and Charisma. Does the Shadowcaster “domain” rule using your pre-existing proficiency/ability supersede the Shadowdancer callout because the Shadow Magic feat was gained through Shadowcaster, not Shadowdancer? Or is a Wizard who takes this Dedication screwed?

Thrawn82 wrote:

GGSigmar wrote:

Looking forward to august order generation and shipping dates. Any idea when we will get them?

What? no i haven't been refreshing the community service forum frontpage every 30 minutes since thursday looking for it. why would anyone even suggest that?

Your only doing every 30 mins? Poser. :)

I’ve had the Customer Service and Secrets of Magic pages up on my phone’s browser. Every time I get a text, I also check the forums. I have a problem.

That problem is my party really needs me to change from Wizard to Magus for us to win the Ruby Phoenix Tournament.

I'm just throwing ideas into the pot at this point, because I hope we can come up with some truely good mechanics.

I read what Larkas and Adam Teles were writing about alternate abilities. I like Teles mechanic for descriptor specialty replacing schools, but for the sake of argument I want to say it's still not different enough from what we already have.

Some ideas:

Bring in a spell customization mechanic, like Monte Cook's Magister, or like the Truenamer from 3.5.

Use Larkas' "Arcane Form" idea, granting the mage his own "evolutions."
He also proposed restricting available spell schools, which strikes me as very cool. I'd add in something like alternate powers, using spell slots as fuel. Sort of like th Metamorphosis transformation for the Warlock in WoW

Hail back to 3.0 and give the arcanist something like psychic combat, with oiffensive and defensive modes.

Remember Spellfire from the Forgotten Realms setting? Perhaps something like that, a raw application of magic to heal, fly and harm (and perhaps some new stuff) combined with being a living rod of absorption. This is my personal favorite. Maybe some of the arcanist's spell slots are "locked" from being restored each day, unless they absorb spells to fill them. Maybe they have a special spell list that can only go into that "locked" slot? Improved counterspelling and spell absorbtion would be a core mechanic of this class, and perhaps at later levels they can "catch" spells cast at them, keep them in the "locked" slots until cast, but never able to fully learn them.

The way I see the arcanist class is borne out of comparison to the Wizard and the Sorcerer.

Consider: The wizard studies magic, through the lens of school specializations. Think of it like a college student. You can study communications, psychology, economics, sociology, history or politics. However, at the core of all of these fields you're really trying to understand how humans work, just in different fields.

A sorcerer on the other hand, intuitively understands magic. She can cast spells simply by feeling them out. Think of her like the person at a party who just gets people. She is the natural salesman, or the magnetic politician. They just "get it." Unlike the college guy who studies people through academic fields, she knows the same things intuitively.

The arcanist represents something in-between. The current interpretation I'm seeing from a lot of people is that the arcanist is a "sorcerer who ended up going to school." I think that's cheating the potential of the class.

I prefer to think of the arcanist as a "genius." Schoepenhauer said, "talent hits the target no one else can hit, genius hits the target no one else can see."

Perhaps the arcanist studies magic in a way neither (or any) class has before. They see the next step in understanding how it interacts with the world. This is why they can cast in a semi-spontaneous way. They understand the spell, but more importantly, they understand the way magic works with the universe. They have more refined control over magic than either the sorcerer or the wizard.

If I could influence the class, I would dump the blood pool concept. Instead, I would add a series of abilities surrounding the motif of magical genius. Allow the arcanist more control over the effects of his or her spells. Let them change things like area, range and duration and element type. They already look to be focused on fluidity, embrace it, and separate them thematically from the sorcerer and wizard.

I'll spend some time tday thinking of more specifics on an ability tree, but this is what I've got for now.