PK the Dragon's page

So I feel like the logic of some of these arguments is something like "Social Skills (and other similar non-mechanical concepts) are important to pathfinder, probably more important than mechanical knowledge, therefore Social skills are part of system mastery".

I don't want to put words into anyone's mouth, but this is the gist of what I'm getting from some of these arguments.

If so... I want to clarify. I don't consider System Mastery to be an inherently positive thing. I don't consider System Mastery to equal "Being Good At Pathfinder" (as a whole). It just means "Good at Pathfinder Mechanics". Someone with a strong grasp of Pathfinder mechanics can be an awful Pathfinder player, if they lack social skills and common sense. But I wouldn't consider that person to lack system mastery... just that they lack other things.

Because of this, I don't really think that just because Social Skills are important they're part of System Mastery. All that says to me is that, yes, Social Skills are important. Vital, even. System Mastery is purely about the mechanical system. Social Interactions are the context that uses the mechanical system. They're connected in that sense, but still two different concepts.

So my point: when I say I don't consider Social Skills to be part of System Mastery, that's not a judgement on the value of Social Interactions. It simply means that I don't think the two are the same.

Hopefully that made sense. Given that there's no real definition of System Mastery, any discussion of it is a bit difficult (and is entirely my opinion and nothing more!)

EDIT: After rereading this post... this was definitely not a particularly well written post, lol. I was struggling to put some concepts into words that I don't usually put into words. Still, I stand by my ultimate point, if not the presentation of it.

Yeah, I don't really think system mastery generally refers to social systems.

System mastery in this context normally seems to refer to [game systems], specifically the mechanics of Pathfinder.

You *could* use it to refer to social systems but I have to agree, that's a really weird use of the term. I normally see it used in discussions about character building, or how to get the most out of a character. Which is a mechanical thing.

Generally, social savviness helps to know when and how to use your system mastery, but that's not the same thing as being [a part] of system mastery.

At best, I can see a second kind of system mastery being used to navigate social systems. I usually call that "Charisma" and it's usually a more intuitive thing, though.

Sounds fun, tbqh.

Far from optimum but that's not what always matters : )

Another pitfall, IMO, is defining yourself by the ways you differ from your race. Not quite as dangerous, but still not terribly interesting.

By this I mean, if the *only* defining part of your character is that you're a Dwarf that drinks tea and lives above ground, that's not particularly interesting either, by itself. What makes Harsk fun is the complete package.

The way I see it, a "normal" version of the race can be interesting if they have an interesting character (character meaning goals, dreams, personality, motivations, which can be informed by race, but shouldn't just be the stereotype of the race). A "rebel" version of the race can be boring if they lack an interesting character. And vice versa, of course.

So the tl;dr is to play a character. You can let the race be an important part of the character, or play a "human with elf ears", all that matters is that the character is interesting. This is also why I don't mind all human parties- if that's the story we want to tell, so be it.

An assassin isn't truly a combat encounter per se. Instead, it's a highly lethal social encounter.

In order to assassinate the PCs, an assassin has to find them. This usually means questioning people who have seen the PCs- unless the players are high enough level to be famous no matter who you ask, and live in a known location. Assuming this isn't the case, this is the first step where an assassin can be discovered- word could reach them that someone was asking questions about them (whether this is likely or not depends on the connections the PCs have made).

Next, they need to scope out the PCs, as Kileanna said. Only an arrogant assassin is going to attempt to do it without scoping out the PCs first, there's too much at risk.

Finally, they have to carry out the operation. If the PCs keep proper watches and have high Perception, there's so many ways this can go wrong.

That's two to three different places for failure to occur. Ideally, the assassin is not minmaxed and the party has a decent chance to discover it, at which point it becomes a game of cat and mouse between the two parties.

That said, if it's higher level, maybe it's not the end of the world if a character gets assassinated. After all, raise dead spells exist. This complicates the would-be assassin's job greatly. He has to kill the PC, ensure there are no witnesses, and ensure that the PC cannot talk or be revived, and not all assassins will be willing to go for that final step (they might not be used to dealing with higher powered targets).

At each point in this process, there's a chance for the PCs to figure out what's going on and launch a counterattack. If they don't, that's their problem.

Granted, this is mostly considering mundane assassinations. If the assassin is a wizard, all bets are off.

Every point of AC is nice, but not essential. I play melee characters with 16 AC all the time. They do perfectly fine. They WILL get hit at some point, but that's a core assumption of the game. Bloodrager has enough HP to take the hit and keep fighting- even at level 1.

What these characters don't generally want to do is try to tank an entire room. It definitely works better with another melee partner to divide attention, or a chokepoint.

Power draws power. A group of wizards might be able to have a field day slaughtering an unprepared army, but that's going to send a huge message to the other major players of the world. You might as well put a massive target on your head.

Now, if the wizards are the only high level characters in the world, then yeah, they're going to stomp.

I expect in a world with strong magic most armies would consider mages and clerics to be vital resources, and mages would be used to counter other mages, buying the peasant horde time to reach the other side. Such battles would also be highly lethal, but that's why we have high level clerics to prevent as many injuries as possible.

I like shooting for 16 CHA on my bloodragers, because it's nice having a martial with the option to fireball swarms when necessary (and 16 CHA gets me to the point where I feel decently comfortable with spell DCs), but it's by no means required.

I also don't consider DEX a requirement on medium armor. A little extra AC is always welcome, but the Bloodrager has buffs to draw on there.

Really, all the Bloodrager NEEDS is STR, CON, and enough CHA to cast spells. Not a particularly bad case of MAD.

I'd honestly argue that until the Drake companion gets a few size increases, it's actually worse than a familiar. The familiar at least has some utility in terms of skills, empathetic link, share spells, etc. The drake is a bit more durable in combat than most familiars, but this is offset by how much it sucks if the drake dies.

As it gets bigger and starts getting Drake powers, it starts getting usable (as in, it's now not completely worthless in combat and is starting to be able to compete with the weaker animal companions), but the drake has too few powers and has at least one ridiculous power tax (Not even allowing the thing to glide without spending a power is a crime. The fact that you need to use four out of five of your powers in order to have a smoothly flying mount is also a crime).

I think it eventually becomes better than a normal animal companion, but only if you don't try to turn it into a flying mount and instead focus on making it independently functional. Of course, by the time this starts happening, animal companions are falling off...

And this isn't going into the fact that you have to sacrifice most of your class features for this scrawny thing.

I wish I could love the Drake Companion, but as it is, it's one of the most disappointing things I've ever seen.

(Since this topic is about frustratingly weak things, I don't apologize for this mini-rant!)

I honestly find that 6th level casters can still use offensive spells, they just have to be a bit more vigilant about targeting weak saves, or else accept that their spells aren't always going to work. I don't particularly minmax my full casters either, so this is nothing new. The only real differences in DC is that a full caster can probably afford a +5 at start while most half casters are more MAD and I find they usually can only afford a +3, and their top level spells are 1-3 levels lower than a full caster's, which also reduces the DC. It's not insignificant, but it's not a deal breaker for me.

Also, I consider the fact that they aren't quite as good as 9th level casters to be something of a perk. It lets you enjoy using magic without feeling dirty about it XD

Bloodrager is a weird case because the spell progression is just so painfully slow for offensive spells, but as noted, you can make the build work. Just because it's not the best way to do things doesn't mean it's not a valid playstyle.

Yeah, Bard has gone far beyond being a simple entertainer. With Perform (Oratory) you can easily have politician bards. Hell, Demagogue is a bard archetype.

Clerics may not work here because you specifically don't want it to be a theocracy, but in general the Evangelist would work pretty well.

I wouldn't discount Investigator. They're one of the better skill monkeys in the game. They won't be able to woo the crowd with fancy displays of magic, and will have to work a bit harder than a normal caster would for some things, but they still are perfect for the task.

I like the idea of an Occultist for this purpose. They have a lot of fun, weird utility abilities that just scream to be used creatively. At the very least, the Enchantment and Divination schools should be helpful here. You can go a lot of ways with this.

And yeah, most of the 9th level casters will do this quite easily. Even Druid, with the right archetype.

Alchemists are one of the best self-buffers around, and they have mutagens to help out with stats and AC. It's definitely doable.

Master Chymist is also an option for the full natural attack mutagen build, though not required.

My second PF character, and third character ever. Murdok Krog, of the Krog clan, a loud-mouthed Dwarven TItan Mauler Barbarian and Hunter of Giants. This was back in the happy days before I understood how Titan Mauler worked. It was a great archetype back then, Murdok dualwielded two Greatswords and generally just yelled at the top of his lungs. We were playing a round-robin where everyone in the group got to be GM for a day. There was another player who was really new, and his session was against something ridiculous like 15 Hill Giants and a Fire Giant boss. They had distance and rocks to throw. We gave it a try, but the tide quickly turned against us, and things looked bad. TPK level bad. So Murdok Krog decided to create a distraction in order to let the others escape. Or rather, he was the distraction, in typical Barbarian fashion. I don't remember the details

He proceeded to be crushed under the weight of ~15 boulders flying at him. But the team managed to get away. To this day, Murdok Krog's grave remains, two greatswords sticking out of a rock pile...

I don't blame the GM, though. He was as new as I was and we barely understood the concept of CR, much how to design good encounters. Besides, it was a great last stand and a fitting end to Murdok's legend.

I don't suppose we can all just agree that the Terrasque is basically a stupid concept--the fantasy RPG equivalent of a pissing contest that seemingly escalates with every revision--and that we're better off focusing on game elements that are actually playable?

No? OK. Carry on, then.

See, I like the Tarrasque. It's a big nasty monster that can't be killed (at least by conventional methods). Like Pyramid Head. Except you can't plane shift pyramid head, or summon endless monsters to delay him, or any of the other ways to negate the Tarrasque. Never the less, the extreme strength of magic in D&D aside, it's still a cool concept and should you ever have a game get to the point where the big T shows up, it should make for an entertaining evening. Possibly a tad anticlimatic if you have a high level caster in the party, but it should still be fun while it lasts. It's not in the fight itself, it's in the dramatic flourishes as the creature rises from it's sleep, and slowly meanders towards the party, the party's reactions as they realize the time is here, they're fighting one of the iconic D&D monsters, FINALLY.

It only becomes problematic, a pissing contest, if you will, when people start to argue about the nitty gritty of what "unkillable" means. That isn't the fault of the Tarrasque, though, just a side effect of human nature. You could say the same about Paladins, for having arguable moral quandaries built into the definition of the class, and we like Paladins right? (and I swear, if this turns into an argument about Alignment morality just because I mentioned the P word, I will brood. Loudly.)

For the record, I've got nothing against having a pleasant discussion about whether the Tarrasque can be killed, and how to do so. The only problem is when it turns nasty.

As I said before, in my case the player had more experience that I did. He was just like that. I'd be more lenient with a new player.

You realize the GM of the game we are talking about is here in the thread right? And that they explicitly tried to help fire obsessed player and explicitly are okay with re-flavoring.

Furthermore they didn't have to guess immunities would come up they were told that they would and they were told they were going into a volcano. If new players aren't putting those facts together and getting fire immunity that is no-one else's fault.

I think we have pretty reasonable expectations of new players.

Okay, I think there's a misunderstanding here. I was at no point actually talking about Kileanna's player, outside of the line "I mean, it sounds like your guy goes above and beyond by blaming the GM" in my first post. In all other cases I was purely talking about my experience with new players, and when I was responding it had nothing to do with that particular example. I took you three to be talking about new players, because the subject of reflavoring was in response to my post about new players.

If you weren't talking about new players but were talking about players in general, or that particular guy in specific, then I apologize. I also did not at any time mean for this to be a criticism of what you posted, Kileanna. It was simply an aside, and then a slight defense of my aside.

Anyway, Nitro, it's cool to know that you've got a pretty good grip of the finer points of tabletop gaming, it's just in my experience new players normally just don't understand that concept. You wrote like someone with a lot of experience with Pathfinder, tbqh, and I mean that as a compliment!

I don't think you guys are really putting yourselves in the shoes of a newer player.

They don't know reflavoring is a thing. When you're new, you're actually excited by the base game, so it won't come to you naturally. Reflavoring spells is not something that often comes up, and may not even be allowed, depending on the GM.

When you're new, you also don't know how freaking common immunities are, and you think "well that's what teamwork is for! If I meet something immune, the rest of the party can deal with them!" This is logic that makes sense against trash fights, but when fighting a boss that is meant to challenge a group of X number of people, and you're at X-1, that's a problem. But new players aren't thinking in those terms yet.

Eventually players get the idea. But it takes a couple of fights with boss outsiders or other powerful creatures that counter you, until you realize what a liability being a 1-trick pony is.

This is common among newer players, particularly those who are used to video games where thematic magic is a thing. Picking magics that aren't the element you're building around feels like power gaming. They don't realize how much the game revolves around picking the right element for the situation.

It doesn't help that the most popular elements for new players, Fire and Ice, are also the most common resistances and immunities.

I mean, it sounds like your guy goes above and beyond by blaming the GM, but the general quandary is one I'm very familiar with.

I enjoy when my party splits and don't punish them too hard for it. The hardest part is juggling multiple storylines, but if, as a player, you split the party, you're pretty much accepting what you get, so I don't stress it much.

I mean, even in dungeons, as a rule I don't scale encounters to the party, which means the party is likely to encounter enemies that would be difficult to deal with even as a party and should be handled with tactical retreat or avoiding, but they're also likely to encounter enemies that actually aren't that much trouble to solo. It's always better to have more people in combat, of course, but whether combat happens at all is something that party size doesn't influence as much. And as a general rule, the strategy when you split your party should be to ensure that combat doesn't happen at all!

I mean, it's going to get hectic and crazy when despite your best laid plans, something goes wrong. But those sessions are actually really fun, as everything suddenly gets *intense*.

Just a few days ago I had one player drowning in quicksand, two players trying to help him out, and two other players proceeded to scout ahead and run into 32 snakes.

(Yes, 32 snakes. I was running a Frog God Games module.)

Thankfully, one of the scouts was a Bloodrager with Fireball, and proceeded to kill 32 snakes at once. The whole thing was really hectic and everyone was cracking up (except for the player in quicksand who was going WTF the entire time, but he didn't die), it was a high point of the session. It wouldn't have been nearly as memorable if the party hadn't split.

PK the Dragon wrote:

I've been playing an Archer Hunter, and he really didn't work out too well. The Rapid Shot/Deadly Aim combo is nice in theory but has problems when you're a 3/4 BAB class with limited bonuses to hit and low amounts of gear. Accuracy was a constant problem.

The character brought a lot of utility and was the only character capable of fighting flying creatures, but in most combats he struggled.

This was my first time playing a nature-caster animal-companion based character, so I definitely had a learning curve. I'd definitely do some things differently next time.

Did you try using archery feats with produce flame?

I didn't even think of it. Produce Flame is not a spell I... consider often. As I said, it was my first time playing this type of character. Most of my spells went towards healing, entangle, and gravity bow. Oh, I also picked up Touch of the Sea and never used it, lol. Which probably says a lot about my lack of familiarity with the Druid/Ranger spell list.

As far as "not using Deadly Aim" goes...

Without Deadly Aim my damage was 1d8 + 3 in most cases (2 from STR-bow, 1 from Point Blank Shot). I mean, better than missing, but still not particularly great. And the accuracy was still bad enough that I generally hit only once per Rapid Shot. I ended up using Deadly Aim more than Rapid Shot, because we fought a lot of enemies with DR (usually DR/Magic, magic weapons were extremely rare in this campaign, the stores didn't sell them and we only found one +1 Longsword), so overcoming DR and missing half the time was preferable to hitting one of two shots most of the time but hardly doing any damage. (EDIT: Obviously in this case using them both and having -2 accuracy but 2 attacks is generally useful, so I generally used them both, but my point is I really needed Deadly Aim in several cases. )

Either way, not a great situation to be in.

I mean, there were some other problems. As a party, we were notoriously bad about prebuffing, I forgot to make use of the one teamwork feat I had, I forgot more often than I liked to use my Animal Focus to squeeze some extra accuracy into attacks (or combat started when I was in Darkvision mode, that happened a lot too). So I decided to play a simpler character.

My new character is a melee paladin/battlerager multiclass (...trust me, it IS simpler) and while I am NOT good at archery by any means with my glorious 10 DEX and 0 archery feats, I actually feel about as decent at archery as the Hunter as long as I use Smite Evil (not ideal, but in a pinch...) and the enemy is not in melee. Which isn't super impressive, but not horrible for a backup combat style. Really I only miss the animal companion, that Heron also had terrible accuracy and only one attack, but made an excellent distraction.

This has been my experience. GMs, myself included, usually only allow templates or monstrous races if everyone has them.

As for the barbarian having no "RP value", I hate this argument so very much. I despise it utterly. Lack of "RP value" is nothing more than lack of player investment. Can you "roleplay taking baths in lava without fire immunity"? No, but that's just stupid. The better question is "do you need to take lava baths to role play?", and the answer is obviously no. Just because your character can't do something you would want him to doesn't mean he can't be roleplayed.

Honestly, the real question there is "Is taking lava baths vital to making your character concept work"? I mean, more than just "it'd be cool and/or quirky if i could do this", I mean "I need this or else my character concept doesn't work".

I can't see a reason why taking a lava bath would be that important. It's, quite frankly, a pretty horrible example. But, if for some reason as part of the world setting there was a city in a volcano filled with outsiders with fire immunity, and a player wanted to come from that city, then I'd be willing to work with them on that, because that's grounding the character in the world, a VERY good reason, and that's a legitimate reason to look into giving them some benefits that make the character functional. Probably not a template, because again, I don't like giving out templates, but I could probably work in fire immunity (in exchange for weakness to Ice, for example).

Anyway, you can absolutely RP as a Barbarian, I love the class, and I love RPing it. But not everyone enjoys RPing the same things, and when you have a *really really good* concept that sings to you, I can understand how settling for less can be discouraging. It does mean a lack of player investment, but that's not a problem with the player, it's a problem with the game as a whole that needs to be solved, preferably through communication and compromise.

I've been playing an Archer Hunter, and he really didn't work out too well. The Rapid Shot/Deadly Aim combo is nice in theory but has problems when you're a 3/4 BAB class with limited bonuses to hit and low amounts of gear. Accuracy was a constant problem.

The character brought a lot of utility and was the only character capable of fighting flying creatures, but in most combats he struggled.

This was my first time playing a nature-caster animal-companion based character, so I definitely had a learning curve. I'd definitely do some things differently next time.

This sort of houserule would both complicate the game and punish players by breaking their stuff. I'm not terribly interested.

I consider any AC bonuses from clothing or incidental items like backpacks to be covered in the 10 base AC that keeps every goblin with a knife from having a sure hit against even the most defenseless caster.

I don't mind this. My logic is, characters are smarter than we are, better than navigating their world due to being citizens of their world, while we have a level of removal. The group-mind helps to reduce that level of removal. Discussing tactics before a fight reduces the chance of making bonehead decisions that our characters, being fighting experts after all, would never do. If some guy happens to know a lot more about castle design than most of us, fantastic, that balances out the fact that chances are the rest of the party knows far less about it than our characters probably should. (that said, if a plan is reliant on a ***really** obscure detail of castle design, then yeah, I'd tell players to roll knowledge engineering- but allow it to be rolled unskilled due to them figuring it out by player skill).

What this is, is allowing and rewarding Player skill instead of Character skill. That is an important part of the game, just as important as the stats you have written down.

That said, ultimately a face shouldn't feel useless because they don't get an opportunity to roll because other players made a good diplomatic argument. Diplomacy, Bluff, etc, those cover the DELIVERY of an argument, so even if other players come up with a good argument, they still need the skill to convey it.

Same with knowledge skills against monsters. There's very strict rules on just how much knowledge characters have on monsters, and while I've got nothing against using common sense, if people want to know exact details about what a monster does, they've got to roll. This is where metagaming can really be problematic, because there ARE mechanics here.

At the same time, though, I wouldn't rule that someone has no idea what an orc is, in a world where orcs are super common, just because they lack the right knowledge skill. Otherwise you run into a problem where characters are unrealistically stupid unless they've got the right knowledge skills. And this is where player skill can be allowed to come in- if a player figures out what it is, and it's common enough that it would make sense for characters to know what it is, then there's no harm in confirming it.

Anyway, amazing things happen in this game when 4 or 5 brains combine to work on a problem. It's one of the reasons I GM, to watch the process. So I like to encourage it where I can. That's what makes PF different from a video game, or a board game, is that level of player engagement and creativity.

Wow, I missed that this is core only. That actually makes the Fighter/Monk combo even more unfortunate.

I stand by my previous comment though. You can make Rogue work, you just have to really pump that Stealth and Perception, as well as other skills that would be helpful for a scout. Then you move slowly and carefully, and pick your battles. There will be complications. You'll probably die a horrible death, sooner rather than later. But, I mean, that goes without saying. It should be good fun while it lasts, though.

Another idea that comes to mind is a Mystic Theruge-style Wizard/Cleric multiclass to cover as many bases as possible. The split spellcasting really does suck, but it's a great way to cover all the possible spells you might need. Make sure you start with level 2 wizard spells. For traps, give the Fighter a 10 ft pole and stay a room behind him at all times! This is probably what I'd do if I was serious.

I'd probably enjoy an all-martial group with 3 of the worst classes ever taking on a lethal megadungeon more, though. ;)

Depends on the template. Most templates are just power boosts that can potentially be abused by players if given the opportunity. Others offer fun RP opportunity like vampires and werefolk. Lichdom for example I am totally cool with because you have to pay a boatload of money for it. I did one monster campaign recently where several players did indeed use templates to boost stats. Was only ok because everyone had the option to do it and nobody went too crazy(in character creation anyway). Most of the time if a player wants to do something like half elemental or vampire, in a normal party, it is just much easier to make a new base race to keep things balanced.

Yeah, I more or less agree on this. I find Lichdom one of the more interesting templates for players and if a player actually has "become a lich" as a goal, spend 11 levels working towards that goal, and pay a ton of money for that goal... I'm going to let them have it.

Likewise, if something happens naturally due to RP, like becoming a vampire, or catching lycanthropy, I'm not adverse to slapping a template on that character to reflect that, provided that it would still make sense to play that character within the party.

In other words, if it's a goal for the character or happens as a consequence of story events, I'm ok with it. If it's arbitrarily taken for stats, I'm not going to allow it. If it's a legitimately vital part of a character concept, then I *may* be okay with it depending on the reasoning, but I'll probably want to find a way to avoid needing to take the template if there is one, and there usually is one.

I'd sum it up as " I want to be the flame dude and use exclusively flame spells, oh cool this helps me still be a thing in battles against enemies with immunities"

We may scoff at loading up exclusively on one damage type, but for new players and RP purists who want a *very* thematic character, spells like these help.

Not at all. Animal Companions are quite strong early on, at least if you pick the right ones (Cats, Dinosaurs in general, Rocs are the obvious ones). They just have an early peak. The early levels should actually be really impressive as you get two martials for the price of one. Animal Companions do fall off, but you still have a solid Barbarian with less class features and delayed rage, and you should still have enough Rage powers to do the whole pounce thing. Level 7 will also be impressive as you AC gets a buff, and then after that is when you start running into problems, but it should still be perfectly playable.

Mammoth Rider in theory could help with the upper levels, and would be fun to try with this class, but the size of the animal companions (and limit of AC choice) make this hard to pull off. But if you do, it'll be legendary!

It seems like it'd be really good at 1st level if you pick the right animal companion, peak at level 4-7 or so, and from there get steadily worse.

Fighter Monk and Rogue are certainly not the first classes I would consider when attempting to take on Rappan Athuk of all places. Much less a party of ONLY those 3 classes.

Rappan Athuk doesn't mess around. You go hard or you go home...in a bodybag. Spellcasters are necessary. Well rounded classes are necessary. Fighter, Monk & Rogue leave a lot of holes in the party, and none of them (save perhaps the monk) have decent personal defenses.

Rogue is decent for Rappan Athuk. Stealth and the ability to disarm traps matter more here than in a lot of the sorts of theorycrafting that usually leads to Rogue. I wouldn't take in vanilla Rogue though, Unchained or bust. And yeah, slapping trapfinding onto another class is probably preferable, but that requires very specific builds or a trait that is not necessarily going to be allowed. Rappan Athuk was clearly made with Rogues in mind, so it's not the end of the world to play one.

That said, Fighter and Monk have very limited usefulness here, and seeing both makes me sweat. This is my big worry. It'll be fine if there are more than 4 players (as long as the other players don't show up with martials). Still, I'd be considering Archaelogist Bard or Eldritch Scoundrel here, just to bring as much to the group as possible.

Ultimately, Rappan Athuk is more about playing intelligently than minmaxing or putting together the perfect party. A well optimized party will die almost as quickly as a less optimized party if they make bad life choices, and a less optimized party has a chance, if they're really really careful, of making it the whole way. That said... spellcasting really, really helps.

Being that guy on high school: it's OK.

Being him at a job where you work with human lifes: not so much.

Yeah, no doubt. Heck, even if human lives aren't involved, if you're accepting a pay check for something, then you should *probably* treat it seriously and get help if you are having trouble. I was just recounting that story because of SUDDEN MEMORIES, lol.

I will say, I question how your example still has a job. I mean, I wouldn't hire myself for anything lab-related, and I at least know what a periodic table is.

(Thankfully, Pathfinder isn't nearly as high stakes, so I still say it's worthwhile to talk over problems before going straight to dropping the person from a group- if ONLY for the sake of avoiding needless drama and hurt feelings, if nothing else. )

Tableflip McRagequit wrote:

"I'm at my wit's end here, and I hope someone has some advice. There's this guy in our lab who can't even remember the periodic table. Every morning, I set out his test tubes, light his burner, and carefully label the chemicals we need him to mix. I'm really trying to get him interested. He does like it when things turn different colors, and seems pretty engaged at that point. What can I do to make him stop mixing up vials at random, before something explodes?"

I know this person. She works with me. She doesn't make things explode but I had to work extra time because she ruined her work and left early so someone else fixed her errors. She has been responsible of many very sick people to have to get their tests made again.

So yes, I can tell that this happens everywhere.

Correction: she doesn't know what a periodic table is.

I was this guy in high school chemistry. It was awful. It was the first class in the morning and my brain wasn't fully awake, and I struggled understanding the math and concepts behind the lab concepts while everyone else got to work on the lab. My lab partner was constantly finishing the labs before I even understood what we were doing, leaving me scrambling to figure what exactly he just did, what the results were, and what they meant. There was a lot of frantic copying as the class ended.

Unfortunately, being the youngster I was at that time, I wasn't emotionally mature enough to admit that I needed help and a slower pace, and just barely made it through that class with a C or a D. I'm sure it looked like I was taking advantage of my lab partner to coast through the class, too.

Of course, this was required, as opposed to something I did for fun or as a career path. Still, those posts brought back memories. Bad, repressed memories, lol.

idk about torture but i do know that necroing paladin alignment discussions should count as an evil act.

54. Fail Sense Motive against the BBEG and help him end the world.

This is ultimately very simple:

- Does he contribute to a positive social atmosphere?

If so, there isn't much of a problem.

- Does he negatively affect the social atmosphere due to his inability to play the game?

If so, talk to him and discuss the problem and potential ways to fix it. If that doesn't work, then you should let him go.

Recycling some previous low level creatures as minions greatly reduces the necessary work for the GM. Players are usally quite occupied with themselves and do notice only a few things about their foes anyway. Hence you can get away with an interesting boss - minions can be repetitions without a problem.

Yeah, this is some great advice. Heck, APs often do this anyway- there's often a few "generic mook" statblocks that get reused. Just use those.

Or, pull a relevant bestiary monster. Those are also pretty easy.

Another addition to my earlier suggestion of "make intelligent boss monsters act intelligently" is to have the boss attack in the middle of a battle against otherwise minor mooks. Combat is loud, and if there's a miniboss a couple rooms from combat, it's not strange that they'd want to check it out. The result is a battle that the PCs were not expecting.

Just don't use this trick TOO often. Used once, it's a memorable twist. Used over and over, it's a dick GM move.

Yeah, I do the same as Claxon- though I don't keep things strictly equal to the party's numbers, but I like to have at least three enemies in any battle I intend to be challenging.

The trouble, though, is that if this is an Adventure Path, I can understand the resistance to modifying it.

In that case, what I suggest is to play the enemies intelligently when you can.

- Have boss enemies move. If they become aware of the players (which should be easy, it's not hard to hear the sound of battle, and if they have minions reporting to them, or divination spells, it's even easier), they should move to the best spot for ambushing the party in their favor. Which usually isn't the obvious boss room at the end of the dungeon.

- Have boss enemies group up. I have my big dungeon minibosses basically bee line for each other the moment they hear trouble. This ends up creating ad hoc boss groups.

This way you can increase the difficulty of the AP without actually adding to the prep. Everything is done on the spot, using the creatures already in the dungeon. Granted, These sort of strategies work best for intelligent enemies in dungeons or situations where they can become aware of the party before the party gets to them. It doesn't work so well for that single dragon in a cave, those encounters the best thing to do is just add minions. Or traps. I love a good trap in a boss encounter!

If the game is built on escalating tension, the comic relief, de-escalating the tension, damages the timing, and, effectively, the game. If you don't like tension games, don't play in them, but don't mess them up because they aren't to your taste. The comic is not always a relief, nor always welcome. Find this out before you become a disruption.

EDIT: I think we'll just have to agree to disagree. I feel this could turn into a playstyle argument, and this topic would be an awful place for that.

Try to match the tone of the game. Don't play like Yakko, Wakko, and Dot when everyone else is playing like Rand, Perrin, and Aviendha.

Slight disagreement here. It's perfectly fine to be zany comedic relief in a serious game. That sort of contrast is what makes Pathfinder fun. The trick is knowing how far to take it and when to tone it down a little. My advice is to treat the character as a real character, give them desires and depth, and know when that character would buckle down and actually treat things seriously.

And as always, discuss the character with the GM to try and get a sense of how the character fits into the world.

Magical Child's problem isn't that it's too anime, it's that it's not anime enough.

I mean, I think it would work for some of the easier magical girls (I could probably make Precure and Utena work with this), but for any with memorable finishing moves, or summoned weapons like Nanoha, it falls short.

Yeah it is an easy call for people to make, and yet in practice you will find very little application of it.

Pathfinder is a game about exploration and taking the adventure TO the opposing force, hence you will almost always be set up fighting on ground not of your choosing, where the resident enemy has also probably been able to set up basic defences.

You will also (almost certainly) be just dropped on the edge of a map by your GM and have to immediately play the cards you just got dealt.

There is very little opportunity to use the environment to your advantage, and very few RAW mechanical bonuses for doing so.

How often do you get to say to the GM "Nah I won't attack now, I'll come back just before dawn when we also have heavy rainfall or a snowstorm"

This really depends on the game. In a sandbox game where the party plays their cards right, they actually CAN wait until the weather is right. They can send in a scout first to do some limited checking of the terrain. They can send in hirelings, even! In some cases, they may even be able to lure an enemy group *out* of the dungeon and into a trap.

I in particular am a GM who enjoys running defensive battles. There's less exploration, but more tactics in a siege type battle. Plus, I can go more all-out if the players have time to prepare and all the resources they can think of available to them. It's definitely not the default mode, but that doesn't mean it doesn't happen.

That said...

- If you can't pick your environment, bring the environment to the enemy with things like the aforementioned caltrops (and bear traps, I like the way you think, Halek!).

- Once you start exploring the dungeon, try to identify places where it'd be advantageous to fight a defensive battle, and try to lead the enemies there. Chokepoints, areas with cover, etc. This depends to a degree on how intricate the dungeon design is, but even the most basic dungeons tend to have choke points. In any case, take careful note of *anything* you think you can turn around to use on the enemy.

- More extreme, but far less universally useful, it may be possible to dig through walls to approach enemies from unexpected directions. This is one of those things that is 100% easier with casters, because mining your way through a wall is loud and slow. In other words, reshape the dungeon to catch enemies off guard.

And yeah, this honestly helps casters just as much if not more than martials. They just have so many more ways that they can fundamentally shift the arena of battle. But using the environment is still useful for everyone on some level.

The biggest problem isn't that these types of strategies can't be used, it's that recognizing opportunity and taking advantage of it is much trickier, and slower (in real time) than just charging the enemies head on and going from there. And if not everyone is ok with your superb plan to tunnel into the boss room from the entryway of the dungeon, you're likely to get some vetos from people who just want to do it the normal way.

Really this is an order-of-operations question - do you change the hp to half it's masters then add the Toughness, or do you add Toughness to what it's HP would be, then change the HP? I'd consider it to be the latter. Toughness applies to what the HP would have been, and then the familiar specific rules otherwise overrides that total.

I will say, in my own games, I'd allow the +3 Hp from Toughness if someone really wanted it. It's 3 HP, not going to break the bank.

I mean, I don't disagree with that, I just put more stress on the importance of the lower levels, and I also stress that despite all that, the Druid is still a full prepared caster, it just has a weaker spell list. I think it's still pretty competitive until level 13 (and even then is still an overwhelming force in most games, just a little less so than the other casters).

I'm not saying that the Druid is better than Wizard, or a well played Cleric. Again, I do consider it a tad better than Sorcerers and Oracles though, who don't get to benefit as much from their superior spell lists.

And again, on the usability front, the Druid always has a fallback strategy of "melee things to death", even if he prepares the wrong spells for the scenario. If he gets surprised, Wild Shape, no need to worry about rogues with step up starting the combat next to you, you can handle that. He always has a meat shield willing to be between him and the enemy. And then when the opportunity presents itself, caster them all to death as usual. This may not be pure power levels in it's traditional sense, but for a player like me it's significant. I don't always prepare the right spells for the right occasion, sometimes my spell picks for spontaneous casters are awful, so it's nice to play a caster with a strong fall back strategy.

Yeah, I feel like the Druid is stronger than is being given credit for. I mean, I definitely feel it tapers off later on, but for the levels I actually play (and most people seem to actually play, given adventure path typical levels), the Druid is excellent. I wouldn't put it at Wizard tier, but I'd probably put it above Sorcerer and Oracle.

As far as usability goes though, Druid is top of my list. Wild Shape helps with a lot of common problems that face adventurers without having to manage spells, and having a martial character for a pet is just amusing. Poor, poor martials.

@ PK Ok, I do all of those things as a long time player almost exactly as you note them...get outa my brain with your telepathy....FOIL I need FOIL...!

In all seriousness, all of PK's points are excellent points, common sense among adventures is not always common after all...bravado and a % of reckless is required for the job, but preparation is key! :)

Yeah, I specifically mention them because I had to learn every single one of them from experience. It may seem common sense to use a wand of Cure Light Wounds, but in the beginning it isn't obvious! And nothing is more embarrassing than heading into dungeon without a light source.

And sometimes it's easy to get so caught up in how to make the perfect fighting master that you forget how to deal with situations that can't be solved with a simple 1v1 trading of blows.

The single best question to ask yourself is "How do I deal with situations out of my character's comfort zone".

And truth is, no character is prepared for everything. That's why you have a party. But everyone should be able to at least fight flying enemies, swarms, and aquatic enemies at some level, or else your inability will make a fight harder.

Oh, I forgot another biggie. Swimming. Make sure you can swim. The best way to avoid water difficulties is to avoid water, but that isn't always an option. Swimming is something every character should be able to do at a basic level. I've seen a fight turn lethal because only one character in the party could swim, and when that character got attacked underwater by a kelpie (failed a will save, lol), half the party stared blankly, not sure what to do.

Ok, here are the lessons I learned as I graduated from basic PF to more advanced games:

- Make sure you have a source of vision in dark places.

- Always have a way to deal with flying enemies, AKA always carry a ranged weapon. Even spellcasters should have a light crossbow at low levels.

- In general, carrying backup weapons is great. Try to have a Slashing, Piercing, and Bludgeoning weapon if possible. Also try to have a Cold Iron or Silver weapon (archers can use Cold Iron/Silver ammo so they don't usually have to worry quite so much). Having one of these weapons with reach is nice too. You don't have to keep them completely up to date, but having even masterwork versions of these weapons on hand is good in a pinch.

- Healing: Use wands of cure light wounds instead of vital spells per day when you can. Condition removal is generally more important than health healing. Because anyone can use a wand with Use Magic Device, anyone with that skill can be an hp healer, just have a plan for dealing with conditions.

- Always remember your basic items. Never leave home without Alchemist's Fire for swarms if you lack other AoE. 10 ft poles are a classic for a reason. Pickaxes, shovels, and crowbars are all useful. I enjoy using Bags of Flour to fight invisible enemies, even if there are more practical ways to do it.

- If your GM makes you track weight, well, Handy Haversacks are great. Before that, remember that donkeys exist, as well as hired hands. Not all GMs will allow a squire- type hired hand without leadership, but most will allow pack animals- and will probably be delighted, because pack animals add some texture to a party.

- Connections. This isn't useful with all GMs, but I treat every NPC as a potential resource- wizards and clerics are of particular value, but almost every NPC has the potential to be useful. If you encounter a swarm that's just too strong for your 1 AoE guy + alchemist fire users to handle? Time to contact that wizard you met. NPCs can also help you with knowledge- both general knowledge skills, and regional knowledge. Maybe you can find an NPC that knows something about the upcoming dungeon, so you don't have to go in blind!

- Never forget you can retreat. Now, there's some enemies that are difficult to get away from, but a lot of enemies can be disengaged from, or will give up. Retreating isn't always free, but it's better than a wipe, and if you can gather some NPC help and return better prepared, it might make a difference.

One thing that draws me towards a more imperfect hero than a Superman is skill ranks.

A paladin excels at fighting evil, healing, even using a bit of divine magic... but for day to day activities, the paladin is significantly weaker due to only having 2 + INT skill ranks. Paladins end up, in my experience, either with only a few really good skills, or a decent amount of mediocre skills.

So the mechanics of the Paladin seem to pull towards a character that excels in specific situations (places where the awesome paladin abilities are helpful, like combat), but then has trouble outside of those specific situations. Which seems like a great fit for a troubled hero who is only human but trying to be the best person he can be, less great for trying to be a superman who is awesome at everything.

Glorf Fei-Hung wrote:

Then... even IF we assume Conscription is evil (which I personally am nowhere near), merely saying it may be necessary is not performing an evil act. If the Paladin is actually the one conscripting people, then THAT would be the paladin committing an evil act.

That's a slippery slope I'm not willing to go down.

"I didn't torture and kill the prisoners myself. I just told the others it was necessary."

Of course, I don't actually think conscription is necessarily evil, so I don't think that comparison holds.

I almost feel it'd be better if the Paladin was doing it himself. That makes sure it's done as humane as possible.

I'd also probably have any paladin I had back this plan personally ensure the conscripts are well treated and considered to not be canon fodder.

And, to be quite honest, I'd probably attempt to come up with a heroic plan that only requires the appearance of numbers, as opposed to actual numbers, so that all the conscripts have to do is show up to the battle and act intimidating, while a small group of heroes perform most of the heavy lifting.

Because that's how we do it in Pathfinder.

I enjoy playing skill monkey classes these days, particularly the 6th level caster ones. Investigator, Bard, Inquisitor, even Hunter in some ways.

With these classes I feel it's a bit easier to get away from building a character that specializes in one thing, and more easy to craft the character I want to play... without resorting fully to the cheese of a 9th level caster.

That said, I enjoy Sorcerers too.Very possible to create a thematic sorcerer that is easy to play, just a shame about the skill points.

These are the official definitions of Good and Evil in Pathfinder:

"Good implies altruism, respect for life, and a concern for the dignity of sentient beings. Good characters make personal sacrifices to help others."

A lie that protects someone is actually pretty explicitly good.

"Evil implies hurting, oppressing, and killing others. Some evil creatures simply have no compassion for others and kill without qualms if doing so is convenient. Others actively pursue evil, killing for sport or out of duty to some evil deity or master."

A lie that hurts someone is evil (and no, an evil character's feelings being hurt doesn't count as hurting someone.)

Harder to do that with poison, because poison's nature is to hurt things. Thankfully, the line between poison and drugs is very thin in Pathfinder, and Drugs are known for having medical purposes when used well. Like Medical Marijuana.

Yes, I'd argue they aren't bad things if done for the right reasons.

They aren't good things, but they aren't bad things. They're a perfect example of neutral.

I mean, can you really say lying is wrong, even if you're lying to a corrupt, evil aligned government? Lying is a tool, nothing more. Often it's used for the wrong reasons, but sometimes it's used for the right reasons.

Same with poison, except the chances of it being used for the right reasons are very slim. But not nonexistent.