OrmEug's page

When I first heard the concept of Runesmith as a martial that uses rune magic, it kinda gave me an idea that was a bit more future-proofed than what we got.

I was familiar enough w/ Paizo's designs at this point I knew they wouldn't do it, but I did have a flicker of hope that Runesmith actually used and ripped magic out of all the rune items as part of its core mechanic.

Instead of the class using it's page budget to print a big list of it's own 1-off siloed magics, the Runesmith's text could have instead been instructional translation for how you would interact with the existing rune items; how you would copy out the element, dmg die size, and then paste that data into your own traced rune abilities.
(And there would of course be a RS magic that outright just Etched temp copies of property runes wholesale.)

But for most of their kit, the Runesmith's "runes" would look more like a collection that's all meta / "diacritic" runes, and those meta-runes would use the existing rune items as base datasheets to draw from.

This would include basic relationships between energy types, traditions, debuffs, and "damage-adjacent-effect" for default relationships.

Something like

Energy:Fire | debuff: Enfeebled | dmg-adjacent: persistent dmg

Energy:Cold | debuff: -speed | dmg-adjacent: dmg on foe action

And a RS rune would then use the existing data of a reference rune first, while having default values for any blanks.

So if a rune item had no element, but had a -speed effect, that would default to doing cold damage when tied to a damaging meta-rune.
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That core design would mean that Runesmith would still need a good list of it's own meta-runes that could/should be expanded with new content, but it would also ensure that simply adding new rune items to the game would also expand RS's choices.

Thanks to wep/armor runes already being power-budgeted to occupy a single slot on a piece of gear, Runesmith could use that as a design trick to have confidence against balance...

That is very interesting, it might have made Runesmith both more distinct class and more in line with the whole system.

Should we create a separate post about "what I think final version of Runesmith should be" :)

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4) Amping needs to be better-defined, since choosing whether or not to amp a cantrip isn't any sort of action with any traits, yet it works like a spellshape action due to how it prevents the use of other spellshapes. I'd quite like amping to be defined as a spellshape free action, which would among other things prevent the Magus from amping imaginary weapon as part of a Spellstrike.

I think that would be an elegant solution of Magus imaginary weapon problem.

In general, I'd like Paizo to reuse mechanics they invented already - so use Focus points for as many "once per 10 minutes" abilities as possible, use "flourish" trait for action compressing abilities (like Animist "Step + Sustain"), and so on.

These mechanics were created for a reason and using them would just make system more straightforward and less breakable.

After a bit of thinking and using a previous brew as a starting point, I've compiled a proof of concept of what an ideal Animist would look like to me.

Also, forgot to mention - I liked that each vessel spell gives something on Sustain, now it feels much more solid as a class.

And, changed Embodiment of Battle is better as well - it's kind of Animist' version of Ki Strike or Weapon Surge.

After a bit of thinking and using a previous brew as a starting point, I've compiled a proof of concept of what an ideal Animist would look like to me.

I really like some of the changes to vessel spells, in particular:

Also, I 100% support returning to playtest' version of Sustaining Dance to finally close the topic of Elf Steps and such.

Having meaningful and playable subclasses and more streamlined spellcasting would also make the class better imo.

Doesn't trigger reactive strike

I don’t know about that, you still do Trace a Rune activity and it does have Manipulate trait. Similarly to Spellstrike.

You can do it with Reach weapon though to at least try to avoid Reactive strikes from crratures with standard reach.

OrmEug wrote:

I still can't think about any particular build to use it honestly. If you want to use a crossbow you can use new Sukgung and gain Fatal Aim d12, and you don't need to spend a feat to make advanced weapons work.

On that, I am 100% with you. Volley reduces it effectiveness greatly and while Concussive and Propulsive are good traits (Razing seems meh), I don't think they make up for that. It's a cool weapon if you want to cosplay as an Anor Londo archer from DS1 hahaha.

Maybe if you have sniping duo you can make it work.

I was particularly looking forward to using this weapon for my hobgoblin investigator, cause I don't care that much about deadly, with stratagem you can always try to get around volley and I was looking forward to finally using Hobgoblin Weapon Familiarity feat. It lost a lot of its appeal with this reload 1 though but I'll probably try it anyway, will see how it works.

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I mean, RAW, if anything uses bolts, IT IS a crossbow. It's the ammunition used by crossbows, quoted from the book. Some other weapons, like the taw launcher, can also be crossbow even if they don't use Bolts, but they should be marked as such (like in that case).

EDIT: Even though the weapon looks like a bow, mechanically it should be counted as a crossbow since it uses bolts, I think that is the reason they gave it bolts instead of arrows or "big arrows" or whatever.

It's an interesting point, so it is RAW a crossbow then crossbow feats can be used with it as well.

OrmEug wrote:

Phalanx Piercer - I still don't see the case to use it over Composite Longbow. You can use some of the gunslinger feats for it but why would you? Gunslingers are not made for bows. If it was a crossbow, then maybe, but it's not.

But it is a crossbow, it uses Bolts as ammunition.

Bolts, from the core rulebook: "Shorter than traditional arrows but similar in construction, bolts are the ammunition used by crossbows."

definition of a crossbow is somehow vague in pf2e, but based on the picture I've seen it's not a crossbow.

...Phalanx piercer is basically double that range with propulsive built in. Lager range and more potential damage on top.
Build wise since it has a reload speed, your gm would probably allow you to use the ranger/gunslinger crossbow feats to get some extra power out of it. Or you can build into eldritch archer and use this for one extra meaty starting shot in combat.
Razing also makes it situationally good since it can destroy shields, structures(locked doors), and even some traps at a safe distance.

Phalanx Piercer - I still don't see the case to use it over Composite Longbow. You can use some of the gunslinger feats for it but why would you? Gunslingers are not made for bows. If it was a crossbow, then maybe, but it's not.

Longbow has longer range + deadly d10, so damage wise it's not that different. Eldritch archer power comes from the spellstrike, the biggest part of it is spell damage, not bow damage die - and you can use longbow better as eldritch archer cause you don't have to spend your actions on reload.

As I said - I don't really see any build which would use this bow at all, even if it was a martial weapon, and it's not - it's an advanced weapon.
Maybe I'm missing something, would be glad to be corrected. I was just really looking forward to hobgoblin weapons finally and I'm a bit disappointed. So we're having hobgoblin weapons now, but who's going to use them?

OrmEug wrote:

knights of last call preview is there and Phalanx Piercer is reload(1) bow. Still hope it's a misprint

The Phalanx Piercer is described as being absolutely massive. I don't think it's a misprint, considering how hard it hits (1d10 + Propulsive + Razing + Concussive) and the flavor of the writeup.

Sort of a Hawkeye Gough situation, as it were.

Ok, but what is the use case? I can't think of any build where this bow is actually useful.

knights of last call preview is there and Phalanx Piercer is reload(1) bow. Still hope it's a misprint

Thanks for your enthusiasm. We are working blogs and a video to promote this rulebook. We are giving out early PDFs to media for exclusive previews. None for those are ready yet.

We launching this month's products, primarily the new Gatewalkers AP. We are planning the next Paizo Live, PaizoCon, and live plays. We have current sales and upcoming sales to promote. There is heavy internal processing of the ambiguousness of the industry right now. We are also trying to carve out time to hire a new Marketing and Media specialist whose job it will be to do much of this, rather than myself. I confess I am struggling to get it all done have a work-life balance. Thanks for your patience and patronage.

Thank you for your reply. It's much more important that Paizo as a company and all employees will keep afloat, and hopefully will have good work-life balance. You're doing insane amount of awesome work for TTRPG community. I can definitely wait as much as needed for the previews.

Time for more spoilers? :D

From what I've heard January 11th is when we're going to start getting reviews of the Treasure Vault. Only seen it on /r/Pathfinder2e, have no idea when do they get this info.

Do we know the identity of those Hobgoblin weapons yet?

There is a video showing 2 of them (not sure if they're final) in some sample build.

Breaching Pike - One-handed d6 piercing martial weapon with the Hobgoblin, Reach, and Razing (+2 damage per damage die vs. objects, ex. a shield used for Shield Block) traits.

Phalanx Piercer - Advanced d10 piercing bow with a range increment of 60 feet. Has the Hobgoblin, Concussive, Propulsive, Razing (see above), and Volley (20 ft.) traits.

see the video here.

I like to reward people for visiting our product pages. Let's flesh out the Table of Contents

Introduction: Into the Vault

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Alchemical Ammunition
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I really hope alchemical ammunition is going to be present for all types of ranged weapons, including bows, and not only for firearms and crossbows.

Very excited for both Alchemy Unleashed AND hobgoblin weapons!

I'm really looking forward to Treasure Vault release coming February, especially the "Alchemy Unleashed" part.

I've read that there will be some new poisons there, is the goal is to expand the assortment of poisons or could we expect more powerful ones (based on level)? As far as I know, poisons are not really useful right now because of their low DC and only targeting Fort.

Are there any alchemical ammunition in the book? I really like the idea of non-magic ammunition, but at the moment there are very few alchemical ammunition exist.

Finally, could we probably expect any preview before the release?

Hi,

I love the Investigator class as Int-based martial, but honestly list of features seems a bit underwhelming, at least for some types of campaigns - dungeon crawling for example. Also having Devise a Stratagem as a free action really depends on GM style, at least from my experience.

From what I've seen the best way to play investigator is to dip into some caster class to utilize high int and the fact that spell attacks are not covered by Devise a Stratagem. Which is a bit sad - I would really like to be able to play competitive Investigator without need to cast spells.

So I guess my question is - is there any chance that there're some review / fixes might be coming for Investigator?