Paul Barczik's page

Poi being a simple weapon makes absolutely no freakin' sense.

Draven Torakhan wrote:

but when I only have 12 rounds of Rage,

That sounds like edition confusion.

PF2 Rage lasts for 1 minute (10 rounds). Most battles last about 4 to 6 rounds.

And Rage renews automatically after 1 minute after the Rage ends.

There is no limit to the number of times per day that you can use Rage.

At least not a practical limit that you are actually going to reach. There is technically a theoretical limit based on the number of minutes in a day, but...

...

Bit disappointing we'll be getting the Adventure Path set in Shenmen before the Guides work; meaning we won't have these iconic ancestries as options in the land they're from.

Still hyped, though; already planning on saving up Achievement Points for PFS to eventually buy my tanuki option there.

Tian Xia is getting TWO books in 2023 and 2024, and Samsarans, Wayangs and Tanukis will be added as ancestries.

*Earperk* Did you say Tanuki? I'm sold.

So, let me preface this by saying that A, yes, some people make choices based on fluff/story/roleplaying - I tend to do so as well. Doesn't stop me from sitting back and scratching my head over how some mechanics work out; and that's what I'm questioning here.

So, new character, Animal Instinct Barb, 1st level. PFS, if it matters any. Played in my first scenario with this character yesterday, and didn't rage until the boss battle because there was no need. Str +4, using greataxe. Cat instinct (Ulfen werelynx, etc).

So I rage, lose my d12+4 greataxe, in favor of a d10+6 and a d6+6 attack option, lose AC, etc. Two extra points of guaranteed damage on a hit is nice, but I was really left feeling that raging didn't benefit me in the long run - I felt like I was overall doing more damage with the greataxe than I was with my bite, plus the AC drop when I raged helped see my poor Ulfen drop like a brick early on.

For the sake of damage, does Animal Instinct get better/"worth it" at higher levels?

Centaurs.

Good points, thank you both for keeping it civil. Again, I've yet to play said druid, so you're both quite correct, it very well may play out differently than I'm thinking. It just comes across as severely limited in the reading.

So, standard 'here's my two cents about 2e' post, ymmv, etc. I played through the playtest material, and dove-tailed into the finished version. I have the great pleasure [insert some sarcasm there] of playing with people who are somewhat stuck in the old ways, so I've heard a LOT of 'oh, I don't like this' without any substantiation other than it's different. Personally, I've kept an open mind, and where I might not agree with some things, I can at least understand where most of it comes from.

The three-action system is a thing of beauty. Even the naysayers in my group like this feature. It takes a bit for new players to get used to it, but overall it's just awesome on several levels. Ancestries honestly could have still been called races, and been done. It's a pointless change, but no big shakes there - I'm still in agreement with a lot of people that half-orcs and half-elves should be their own distinct ancestries, though. I do like the customization/focus that is inherent; not only in ancestries, but also in class.

Signature skills from the playtest were great; I firmly believe certain classes should be allowed to shine in the things they do over others. Signature skills helped that. Shame they got axed, it was disappointing to see them go. I liked the variable rage duration in the playtest as well [with the increasing-difficulty flat rolls]. Made sense and added a sense of excitement, but I understand it getting axed as it could be seen as a more complicated mechanic that doesn't need to be there.

To date, I've only played a barbarian, and while I liked the playtest rage rules, I'm good with the final rage duration as well. Aside from the Giant build being kind of suck due to how enlarge rules work now, I enjoy it. What I DON'T enjoy, is what they've done to druids.

I have yet to play one, but I've built one up to 5th level with the intent of switching in the game I'm in when it makes sense timing-and-storywise. Druids have great spells, this is true; they had great spells even in 1e. But if I'm going to play a spellcaster focus, I generally go for arcane - that's just my style. No, I play druids for that wonderful wild shape. And it's there that I've hit a major contention point.

Even with the Wild build choice; the one thing that wild-shaping druids do is extremely limited in terms of how often they can do it. Aside from regular spell-casting, they use Focus Points. Limited to 3 at the max, and not easy to get it up that high. My 5th level druid work-up has exactly ONE Focus Point. So, great, I can wild shape once before 'refocusing', which isn't always easy [more on that snag later]. Wizards have a good range of spells, fighters can swing their swords all day... but my character, whose entire concept is to turn into a bear and maul enemies..can only do it once. Feels bad, man. I will say, I do enjoy how wild shape works in 2e, with the scaling and all... but being so limited in how often I can use it, I don't know if I'll bother.

If anything, some classes need to have more feats like in the playtest, that give you more Focus Points. I know, -some- feats do that now, but we still have the 3 cap, and those feats now are a lot more scarce than the ones in the playtest.

...Okay, so main gripe over. For the most part, gameplay using the new rules has been fun and interesting, in general. There's been a lot of good changes. Just that there's some bad ones as well. Let's talk about Conditions. For a game that, in part, was meant to simplify rules, there's a BOATLOAD of conditions, and it's a bit overwhelming to keep track of them all. Resonance had a bumpy start in playtest, but they hammered it out, and it works well now. If I'm going to talk about magic though, I need to address the wand issue.

Wands are near pointless now, with how they work; and what irritates me the most about them is the reasoning why - as I understand it, one of the devs didn't like his players 'abusing' healing wands, etc. There's an easy fix there, limit access to such things. No, instead, he took this new system as a way to ruin it for everyone. Not cool, at all. I'm not as old-school as some, but I've been around, and I've never had this ''heal-spamming'' issue that supposedly needed to be addressed.

Again, I understand where a lot of the changes come from, and agree with the rationale. Some things -still- need polishing, however, and since the 'final' version is out, I fear they never will get the refinement they so dearly deserve.

The final issue I'll mention is one that pervades the entire core book and indeed, the way 2e functions. It's obvious that Paizo is trying to reach a wider audience, and new players/GMs. Understandable. But in doing so, they homogenized the experience, expecting that everyone should play in one specific way. Remember my refocusing note? Here's the rub. It feels like the developers feel sessions should all play out in a very specific way; some combat, some travel, some downtime. Anyone who's played in campaigns for any length of time should know it rarely plays out so cleanly as that. In the game I'm in; in the area I'm in, decent rest is never a given - which goes back to the point of not enough focus points/wild shape ability. If I can't 'refocus', I'm screwed after only a fight or two.

It's easy to list my complaints here, as it is for anyone... but I stress again that for the most part, I do enjoy this new version. It's the squeaky wheel that gets the oil, however, and the few glaring errors I've seen keep squeaking. I'll be sticking with PF2E, at least for the foreseeable future; but I am -REALLY- hoping we get some fixes somewhere not too far down the line.

Thank you for attending my TED talk.

This is likely true. However, there's been a lot of 'gotchas' in 1e due to vague phrasing, so. Wanted to at least put it out there.

I'm seeing a lot of "OP-or-not" arguments here. That's really not the point. For utility spells, 1 minute is just not enough time. I can make that argument for other utility/useful spells along the board, not just druids.

With 1-minute transforms, it's severely punishing, period. On the other hand, let's be honest, guys. A full day of polymorph is ridiculous on the other side. I'd be happy if the 'regular' animal forms had 10 minute increments, at least. Or hell, a few minutes per level would work too.

Give the beast-focus druids a bone, let them spend extra spell points while in form to 'refresh' the use. 10 minutes isn't bad, but that's still a hell of a risk if I need to go mouse-form and scurry around, and pray like hell that my time doesn't run out right in front of a hostile. If I can pop another Spell Point as my time's getting close to running out to reactivate it, I'd be happy with that, too.

Granted, some of it depends on your GM. But in my case, my GM likes lengthy fights. If a round is 6 seconds, that means that I'm a good melee combatant bear if I need to be, for 10 rounds. Not bad, but sometimes our combats go over that. If a round is 10 seconds, well, that's going to be horrid; only 6 rounds of beast-form usefulness? C'mon.

EDIT: Also, I'm good with a feat to extend the time. But 10th level to get it? That's going to be torturous to get to that point. At the least, could we maybe get that feat a -few- levels sooner?

To repeat a thought I’ve seen here already; please don’t use boons to lock races behind walls.

...Actually, I can get behind this, too. For being a diverse world, and putting out so many awesome races as you did in PF1E, it does really suck that some of them get locked away..

I just want to see another way to get race boons than going to cons. Myself, and most of the people I play with, can/will not likely ever get to Paizo/Gen/Whatever-con, but we still play PFS. So missing out on those bennies is really a disappointment.

So honestly, I'd be happy just to see three things (I know it doesn't really address this article, and I'm sorry about that, but...)
*Easier access to race boons.
*Race boons for GMs.
*And for the love of gods.. we obviously like catfolk. And yeah, proceeds went to a good cause.. but can't we have a Catfolk book again, that there's a better chance of acquiring?

(Sidenote - Or just get me a ratfolk boon and I'll stop complaining about things...)

Yeah.. I advocate fluff, but silly fluff is silly. I go by the spirit of it, and let's be honest, adoption just doesn't work that way. If I was adopted by eagles when I was baby, I wouldn't wake up with wings one day. :P

But hey, that's just my two cents.

Giving the Goblinblood Wars a quick once-over on a pathfinder wiki; it looks like you could very easily modify the Red Hand of Doom adventure in and of itself for Pathfinder, with just a few minor changes. Great suggestion, PFWiki Scribe. I'm half-tempted to do just this myself now.

Okay, so. The game I'm playing in is..unique..so bear with me and please read over everything. Thanks!

I'm in a Pathfinder game (of sorts, the GM likes to use old 1st/2nd/3rd ed charts and stuff, but I digress). My character is a Beastbrood (rakshasa-blooded tiefling), who has wound up being somewhat of a diplomat/'face' in the party; especially considering we're currently in Hell and my heritage gives me an edge in negotiating with other fiends.

My GM has been kind enough to allow me to 'retcon' my class a bit. I'm currently a 7th level Inquisitor with the Preacher archetype. The reason for this is the ability to shout out a warning and make the GM reroll an attack on an ally; aside from being the 'face', I've grown into the role of tactician/strategist. The problem is this; I'm not really pushing the deity/holy aspect all that much (and as a roleplayer, this irritates me, considering inquisitors are tied in to faith heavily). It's not that I could start doing it; it's a matter that it's not how the character fleshed out through play. I know the cavalier and Tactician-archetype Fighter get the teamwork feats and ability to share them, but my character isn't quite -that- melee-focused, and to me, at least, a Tactician is more than just "use this teamwork feat".

Thanks to some deals with demons, I have a rather nice Charisma score. I've been looking at sorc and bard, but I wanted the community's advice.

What class/archetype can I go with to get the best 'bang' for my buck?

*Must be sources only from core hardback books (I.e.; no Companions, etc... Blood of Fiends was a special exception), and as of right now, Occult Adventures and Advanced Class Guide are not allowed.

*I already have the race, that's not going to change. Again, it's a rakshasa-blooded tiefling.

*I'm more interested in class/spell/etc info than magic items to use; as any given item is iffy as to whether I can obtain it.

*A note about my GM's play style... I can (and rather enjoy) enchantments (Hooray Murderous Command!) but where there are plenty of roleplay opps, spells like Charm Person and Detect Thoughts don't generally go over well with him.

....Whew. I think that's it. Sorry for the mega text, and I'm hopeful to see what you guys can come up with!

I have a question regarding the Feral Hunter archetype.

As they don't have an animal companion, they have an ability that lets them apply their animal focus to themselves (as normal Hunters can do when their companion dies).

I'm curious, is this ability in addition to the Animal Focus that Hunters can apply to themselves? Or do Feral Hunters only get the one, with the benefit that it's always active?

I've got a mage in the party I'm running this for. Long-term player, knows to get scrolls, etc. He was wondering if there was a local mage he could buy items/scrolls/various and sundry from.

With Hunclay's death, is there anyone else who fits this bill?

If not, it's no big shakes.. the PC wizard has already figured 'well, if there isn't a resident wizard now, I'll take the spot.'

After all, as we've seen; the Decimverate is kinda.. shady. Who cares if he's somewhat inept? A disposable tool to be used until he gets himself killed.

...Man, I miss Grandmaster Torch and the Shadow Lodge.

I've so far noticed a semi-disturbing trend for the low-tier Season 5 scenarios. Both so far have been heavily diplomacy based.

Now, there's nothing wrong with that, per se; and I fully understand, we can't just toss 2nd level characters into the Worldwound. But diplomatic-type missions aren't everyone's cup of tea (I don't personally mind, myself), but it does feel a bit of a slap in the face to some... Season 5, Year Of The Demon, et cetera.. and you get to be the messenger-boys.

I am hoping to see at least one or two Scenarios come out this Season that have a bit more.. meat.. on them.

This has come up in a few threads, and I've been discussing with my GM. The main question here is, how often can I get my sneak attack bonus dice in a round, if I'm concealed with something like Greater Invisibility?

Does the sneak attack damage still apply to just the first hit, or to all successful hits in that round? Please provide book pages or verbatim on this, to avoid confusion.

Thanks!

Nevermind, found it. :P

I'm still relatively new; but the last I knew, they are not. According to my resources, only the core races, aasimar, tieflings, and tengu are legal.

The only exception to this is if you have a chronicle sheet specifically opening up a new race option, and I'm not sure which races have been "unlocked" in that fashion.

I've not seen anything in the rules about this one way or the other; and I know the people at Paizo actually read and respond to some of these threads, so here goes:

What are the rules/conventions for throwing another PC? In this circumstance, I ran a game where one of the characters was a halfling rogue. And when the halfling positively absolutely needs to get across the swampy clearing/behind the enemy overnight, it was a consensus to pick up and toss said halfling.

I generally did a Strength roll for the thrower, and a reflex save for the throw-ee... with an accepted ruling of a high Strength check by the thrower quite possibly throwing the halfling -too- far (in fact, this happened often, and the players loved it.. much laughter to be had).

Where do the designers and/or other GMs stand on this?

or a summoner whose eidolon is 'her little dead sibling' who looks in on the character (from another plane the afterlife)

I would consider asking this character a Summoner, and giving him an Eidolon with Undead Appearance.

... Y'know, I hadn't even thought of a summoner. Question would be what appearance to give the eidolon, I know the book says it can't look like a 'common' creature.

I'm currently playing in a wild-west Pathfinder game, and my character is an old Vanara monk. We're low-level (2nd at the moment), and the backstory is my character used to be a martial artist of no small talent. Age and time without practicing has dulled his skills (thus the low level).

Currently statted out with high dex and wisdom, moderate intelligence and wits, and a low strength. For my second level, I'm taking either sorcerer or wizard, with my GM working with me and allowing me to use my wisdom score in place of intelligence or charisma for purposes of spell-casting.

I was looking at doing a fairly even multi-classing (1 monk, 1 mage, 1 monk, one mage, etc.). My big question is, with a low strength, is there any options for monks that will still let me do good damage, or should I perhaps just keep on the mage path?

For additional clarification; I had made him originally with the old 'drunken monk' concept; though I am using the Flowing Monk alternate build instead, as I feel it more fluidly captures the martial arts style. As the game played out, he took on a life of his own, and became a semi-crotchety old chinese man much in the same vein as Jade's Uncle from the Jackie Chan cartoon. It's with that in mind (and the fact that our party has no arcane spellcasters) that I started looking at multi-classing into a mage class.

Any help? Our next session is tonight, so quick responses would be most appreciated. :)