Perpdepog's page

I could also see someone potentially wanting to play a Premaster alchemist, too. Some people do like the niche of "all items, all day, every day" that the Premaster alchemist can deliver on with their larger pool of reagents. I don't think anybody in my specific playgroup is that player, at least, not that player who also has the free time to go reading through all the alchemical items, but the option is definitely there should someone want it.

I still accept the existence of spells which have obvious counterparts, but different names, i.e. Ray of Frost. I think Magus & Eldritch Archer need those that changed from a Spell Attack; so few since Remaster.

I do the same thing. I like the options it presents, and my players seem to like it, too. Ray of Frost is a good example; while Frostbite is nominally it's replacement, Ray of Frost has enough differences going for it--the difference in range, an attack roll rather than a save, and a different effect applying if it crits--that it makes total sense to me to allow both.

Also, just wanted to point out that, as of the latest errata, magus can now spellstrike with save spells by default. Eldritch archer is still a bit screwed though, unfortunately.

Most likely, Halflings just don't care what other ancestries call them, and don't really feel the need for a term to refer to themselves other than 'us'...

After all, why make things more complicated than they absolutely have to be?

I wanna say this is even the stated reason, somewhere, though I couldn't tell you where the source was. Maybe PF1E's Halflings of Golarion?

Thanks for clarifying! Much appreciated.

Any ideas for how to best "get it right" if I'm playing at a table?

I imagine all you'd really need is to tell people which of your attacks you have in your hands, and then only use those attacks. There aren't really any special rules for duel wielding in PF2E; that stuff is simulated with feats like Double Slice. Just remember that, if you're wielding your longsword and your main-gauche, you can't also use your hand crossbow and you should be golden.

In the first couple levels, human and gnome's 2 extra hp will be useful...but in the long run, that won't matter. Human lets you start with an extra class feat, which is a very good ancestry feat, but no ability to see in dim or no light, which the others give you.

Minor nitpick, humans do have the Gloomseer ancestry feat, which does grant low-light vision, and leads to darkvision eventually. Probably not what you'd want to pick, but IMO it's worth considering. Desna has a secret presence in Nidal, after all, being a literal light in the darkness for some Nidalese who reject the Midnight Lord.

I think I was half-way down this thread before I realized that it's over ten years old. Explains why nobody was bringing up PF2E books in their discussion, lol.

This is more of a lore ask than a mechanical one, since the existing options could simulate it, but I'd love for their to be mentions of necrocrafts in the necromancer's feats or lore, somewhere. It'd be very on theme for them, too, since necrocrafts are bound together from the remains of multiple undead corpses.

Even if the actual diagetic name were "Riders of the Apocalypse" someone would probably still prefer "Apocalypse Rider" for the singular.

Like "Szuriel is an Apocalypse Rider" scans better than "Szuriel is one of the Riders of the Apocalypse."

I figure you'd only use Riders of the Apocalypse to refer to the collective. There are so few of them, and their positions so well-defined, that it makes more sense to refer to that position. It wouldn't be, "Szuriel is one of the Riders of the Apocalypse," and would probably be, "Szuriel is the Rider of War," instead.

I like it more too, though I do have a mild concern over how difficult it might be to say aloud. Could just be me, but my tongue trips slightly over "macabre spell" in a way it doesn't over "grave spell."

Justnobodyfqwl wrote:

It always makes me a little sad when someone tries something with a specific, intentional, and unique flavor- and the reaction is always "well why isn't this more generic and interchangeable?".

I completely get why you'd want Generic Felines and Generic Canines as ancestries, because a lot of people engage with the ancestries as "tools to build a character concept I already have in mind". But I think it's good, maybe even better, to have ancestries that come with their own unique storytelling potential and thematic ideas.

Agreed. Honestly there's a lot of room to be specific now. If you want a generic caninefolk, just play an awakened animal.

DMurnett wrote:

Something I really want is more playable fey ancestries. We only have Sprites which do cover a lot of your traditional sort of fairy character concepts, but I want better access to more of what the First World has to offer. In particular Satyrs. I would love playable Satyrs.

I'm surprised we have not gotten a proper fey-touched versatile heritage yet.

We do have that series of fey-inspired universal ancestry feats, at least.

Honestly I wish we got more of those, like heritages you pick up later than level 1. It's a cool design space.

Master Han Del of the Web wrote:

I'll counter and say we already have not one but two archetypes focused on creating equipment on the fly in the forms of the Mind Smith and Soul Forger so the design space is also narrowed there.

Fair point, but, "gear" is only 1/3 of what a nanocyte does. Now, I don't know everything about the PF2 class ecosystem nor what's available re: archetypes, but the other arrays - sheathe array, the very interesting (to me, anyways) cloud array, or going even farther afield, the spellcasting eldritch array or Enhanced's defensive-minded body array - are ripe for some sci-fant shenanigans!

You're right that nanocyte is high concept, though. But I think that's just another way of saying "this is something cool, fresh, and unique to Starfinder." Which seems like exactly the kind of thing you'd want in your first supplement, after a healthy covering-of-bases in the Core Six.
Of course I don't think anything's actually to change; I'm just surprised, is all.

The cloud and its benefits are also my favorite part of the nanocyte, at least from a unique mechanics standpoint. I could really easily see the nanocyte having a pool of nanyte points or something that they can commit to different effects, or be able to swap the thing they're augmenting similar to an exemplar.

Granted, I could also see similar systems for the mechanic, with their exocortex becoming a flexible augment they can move over the battlefield.

Something I really want is more playable fey ancestries. We only have Sprites which do cover a lot of your traditional sort of fairy character concepts, but I want better access to more of what the First World has to offer. In particular Satyrs. I would love playable Satyrs.

If you're open to 3P, Roll for Combat has playable nymphs and sidhe in Classic Creatures, and will have fey-inspired dullahan coming out this October in Year of Titans.

I'm still hoping for a big plane-hopping AP, myself. My dream would be some sort of mystery or chase that sees the party moving through each of the Elemental Planes, one per book, though that seems less likely with the shift to more three-part formats.

Is there a mythic AP to play with the new rules?

No. I think that's why James is asking for this feedback, actually, because they'd like to do a mythic AP and want to know how people actually use the system.

Thanks for your playtests, this is good info to read. I wonder if games feel more mythic at lower levels, where Mythic Points have more of an impact on checks.
I always had the impression that Mythic Points were meant to be spent on skill checks and similar at lower levels, and then move to your destiny-specific actions as your level increased. It sounds like either my assumption was wrong, or the philosophy doesn't quite fire, given how much it sounds like the party spent their points on mythic Strikes and casting spells, instead.

The comments about how uneven the mythic destinies are in the stress test encounters is useful information. From my read-through, several of the mythic destiny feats definitely look more useful outside of combat than in combat.

That's also been my takeaway. It makes sense, since mythic play is arguably more focused on giving players control over the narrative as opposed to making them super-effective in combat, but it does make doing playtests like this somewhat difficult, and, unfortunately, those more narrative-focused feats are still going to compete with the combat feats in your mythic feat slots.

It's a 1E dungeon, but Fallowdeep from Midwives to Death is a pretty big dungeon. It's more like three or four smaller dungeons all stuck together.

Andoran is also due for a slight refocus now that the slave trade has largely collapsed across the Inner Sea Region. A big part of Andoran's identity was as anti-slavers. I am curious to see where they place their focus now.

Poking Cheliax with a really really long stick, maybe?

Ennan Seldon, if you're interested in a possible solution, I have a homebrew for both Mythic Resistance and Mythic Resilience here, in the homebrew forum.
I broke the benefits of Mythic Resilience into multiple tiers, so that, while a creature can eventually have an auto-bump to a save, it should probably be the only thing they're getting out of their advanced defenses, and it costs them a mythic point to use in most cases. I'm operating under the assumption that mythic PCs are mythic creatures, so Mythic Resistance would be bypassed by all their attacks, so I also broke that into multiple tiers, with the option for monsters to spend their mythic points to invoke their resistance for a turn so they can be properly tanky without, hopefully, being a slog to fight.

I hope it helps.

I mean, nephilim isn't exactly accurate to religion either since they aren't giants or half-giants. I'm also not an expert on the kabbalah or jewish mysticism but qlipoth aren't creatures but more like embodiments of concepts that are usually associated with evil stuff in contrast to the sefirah (which AFAIK don't have a Pathfinder equivalent) who embody positive concepts and are the emanations from god.

That's my understanding of qlippoth too, though I haven't done any super deep reading or anything. Qlippoth, or qlipot I think I've seen it spelled, are like the husks or shells surrounding the sefirot, which are the fruits of virtue; like the negative qualities that need to be discarded to get to the positive qualities underneath.

Again, I'm sure this is an imperfect understanding, but I suspect that's why qlippoth got their name. The Outer Rifts are like a big rind or shell that encapsulates the rest of the Pathfinder cosmology, and qlippoth are native to the Rifts.

These schools look amazing! Always excited to see more references to the Pactbinder, too.

I hope we eventually get artifact-level motorcycles for the Riders of the Apocalypse in SF2E.

Interesting.

They were known as Riders of the Apocalypse or Four Riders of the Apocalypse in the War of Immortals, with Apocalypse Rider being the mythic path / general term for mortals pledging themselves to ending life and getting a mount from Abaddon.

And in Divine Mysteries they are known as Apocalypse Riders.

I think Rider of the Apocalypse and Apocalypse Rider are meant to be synonymous. I try to make the distinction of Rider of the Apocalypse for the office-holder, and Apocalypse Rider for the archetype, just so I don't confuse myself.

I spy a couple Pathfinder Infinite authors among the writer credits, very nice! I'm also looking forward to more on Druma. I hope we get the PF2E rules for the Failed Prophet and some Druman archetypes.

Clarification, you mean they could have taken Prescient Consumable at level 7, yes? Not level 5? Otherwise I'd be confused on which feats they're intending to retrain.

Assuming that is what you meant, and I'm not needing to oversee some class-and-general feat juggling situation, I'd probably lean a bit more to A or B. It really depends on context; I'm trying to be a bit more fast and loose with downtime at my table, because it feels like the most narrative-forward part of the rules, and in those instances I want my players to engage more with the world around them and feel encouraged to do so. That being said it'd also probably depend on their surroundings, and just how much stuff the others want to do in downtime. If there is a big block coming up I'd be leaning a bit more to B, but if their time was more constrained then I'd lean to A. That provides the level of flexibility I want to encourage, while signaling to my players that the intent here isn't to just swap around all their feats when they feel like, and that there's generally going to be an opportunity cost for doing so. Even that last point is more contingent on the kinds of feats they're swapping. Like others pointed out, I'd be inclined to be generous in this instance because Armor Proficiency is useless for them at this point.

There's a decent chance Battlecry! is tied into an in-universe event similar to how War of Immortals was tied to the death of Gorum and the Godsrain, which isn't too surprising as we've had murmurings of a coming war for some time - there are plenty of theories as to who will be fighting whom, but because I'm extremely predictable, I'm hoping for Cheliax vs. Andoran.

If that turns out to be the case, I think there's at least a chance we might see an update to the Hellknight archetypes - even though the Hellknight orders aren't technically subservient to the Chelaxian state.

Probably more likely to end up in a Lost Omens: Hellknights faction book a la Firebrands, to be fair, but I figure there's at least a possibility.

I suspect we're going to see more than one war popping off at the same time, myself.

I hope we eventually get a witchwarper whose Quantum Field is them overlaying portions of a specific other plane onto the Universe with various effects.

I also hope that we get a soldier who plays extra nice with an eventual implementation of power armor ... mostly because I also really want explicit rules for power armor.

I love the idea of an operative who can throw stuff, and who uses improvised weapons in general, the person who could kill someone with a paperclip sounds very action movie.

I forget if we've got one already, but an envoy who focuses on Performance as their skill for their leadership style. The rest of the party effectively become their camera crew, fellow musicians, back-up dancers, whatever.

And I'd really like to see the alternate expressions for solarian to make the jump. I'm very much looking forward to getting electrical solarians back at some point.

Yea, army mechanics, more troops, and possibly a troop style companion archetype would be cool. Idk how much power a troop companion could have considering the constraints put on swarm master, though

I suspect that if we got a Troop-like companion it'd be pretty heavily limited in what it could do. Troops are arguably more potentially disruptive than swarms, because it's easier to do stuff like hide behind a troop. I suspect that's why it's not possible to summon creatures with the Troop trait; they'd be too effective as literal meat shields, able to wrap around casters and ranged enemies, and guaranteed to survive a couple of hits thanks to how thresholds work.

Oh, I'm also looking forward to all the martially-inclined spells. Hopefully we get an Incarnate spell that calls up the spirit of a powerful warrior, or a bunch of guys, or maybe a cantrip that lets you reload your buddy's ranged weapon at a distance, or generates ammunition.

I'm hoping for some rules and options surrounding troops, or rather Troops, in one way, shape, or form.

I'm also hoping for archetypes representing various military organizations across the Inner Sea. Maybe this could be where we see the printing of the Gray Maiden archetype, along with others, like Druma's Blackjackets.

I'm also always hoping for more weapons and armor. I'm also hoping we get a little something for animal companions, specializations that are especially suited for synergizing with a rider, for example.

Kinda out there, but a system for building and customizing a keep or similar base would also be pretty great.

moosher12 wrote:

I am still dreaming of the day we get a Mesmerist as a prepared occult caster.

I *love* the 1e Mesmerist. Worth pointing out, though, that it was a Spontaneous caster. (I'm pretty sure all 1e Psychic casters were Spontaneous.)

They were, yeah, at least as far as I can recall. I thought the occultist might have been prepared, but they were also spontaneous, just got their spells a bit oddly.

QuidEst wrote:

Abjuration: It's not exactly something that shows up in many stories or stands on its own. You could do something with it.

Abjuration could play into a magebreaker idea. Someone who studies and practices anti-magic options. Break curses and enchantments, render magic items inert, actively reign in direct spellcasting.

something like a champion magus hybrid would probably play nicely with the school.

From what I've seen those concepts always sound better on paper than they work out in play. What happens when you aren't fighting mages?

Speaking personally, the illusionist/mesmerist trope is also one of the core "specialist mage" archetypes that comes to my mind when I'm asked. Illusionists, necromancers, elementalists, and some form of summoner or conjurer.

What you could do is say that you do get the whole pile, but that the VoP character donates their share of it to some charitable cause. So everyone else does still get a lot to choose from, but the overall party wealth stays normal.

This is honestly what I'd probably do, since I personally don't like juggling party shares and treasure percentages, even if I think that's what I should do. I'm also assuming that this option is only in my game because someone is specifically asking for it, so flavoring their item purchases as charitable donations allowing them to keep their vow would work for me and my table, I suspect. Granted, then it's not quite APB.

The Decaying weapon property rune does void damage, but has the Acid trait, which states "Effects with this trait deal acid damage."

Either the type of damage or the trait choice need to be changed, or else some sort of text addendum explaining why this instance of void damage is like acid in some way.

Specifically, the last sentence of the Decaying Rune, which states, "Unlike normal void damage, the void damage from a decaying rune damages objects, constructs, and the like by eroding them away," makes the Acid trait pretty redundant. Maybe it's a holdover from an earlier draft of the rune?

It seems like a fairly one-to-one translation, though I'm not sure how many would want it. The main issue there being that, while you do get all your bonuses when you should, that's also all you'd probably get. Vow of Poverty's bonuses were extremely rigid, leaving no room for any fun magic items, or even semi-required ones, like emergency scrolls, wands, or a staff. You can look to see what other items you want to give a player, folding them into the bonus progression, but the more of those that you grant the closer to the full treasure allotment you get, and less of a cost Vow of Poverty becomes.

There's also an issue from the GM's side, too. Chiefly, you'll want to watch out for how much treasure you give the party, depending on how geared up you are OK with the party being. Any money that would be portioned out for the character with VoP is going to necessarily have to go to someone else, meaning they'll have more wealth to get stuff with than the GM might be expecting. TBH I'd just subtract a PC's worth of treasure from loot, myself.

Also we never saw the designers changes their concepts due players complains here in forum or in reddit. Expect that you will be just ignored or the designers answering that he doesn´t like the idea for the character concept that he is creating.

As a note, this isn't entirely true. The witch became a full pick-a-list caster in its final release, which it wasn't when it was initially presented. IIRC we had options for occult and primal, and maybe arcane? It wasn't originally also going to have divine.

That being said I'm much more in favor of the necromancer remaining exclusively occult. The other pick-a-list casters are broader concepts than a necromancer, IMO. Necromancer as a concept will benefit more from being more narrowly focused and explored, as opposed to the wider net that classes like sorcerer and witch cast, so I'd rather not see room taken up with feats linked to their different traditions.

It seems more an Inventor to me, with a splash of alchemist/caster multiclass. Harnessing lightning to create 'life' sure doesn't seems like a necromancer at least.

Firstly, I think you're confusing me with RPG-Geek. You accidentally put his name next to my quote, and I think we're also in agreement viz what a necromancer is and isn't.

Secondly, I'm talking about from a mechanics point of view; the article has Caromarc as a 13th level alchemist. In PF1E terms I'd probably say he's a Promethean Alchemist, or at minimum has the Promethean Disciple discovery.
If he were in PF2E I'd probably build him as either an alchemist or inventor with a slightly reflavored Clockwork Reanimator archetype, if he were a player.

I hope we get some proper Frankensteinean creature creation options in Rival Academies. The description has us being able to learn "Lepidstadt's bleeding-edge theories on reanimating flesh with electricity," so I'm really, really hopeful on that front.

Mechanically, I suppose my pipe dream idea would be allowing runes to be combined into composite runes, but when you consider how much page space is needed just for 6x6 kineticiat elements to have composite blasts, such a class would have to have a very small number of runes, unless each rune was given a specific "composite effect" that it always add when applied on top of a different rune. Given how runes are fimurther divided into what targets they can be placed on I don't see this working very well, though.

PF1E tried something like this with Words of Power, an alternate take on a spellcasting system. It was very cool, but also incredibly clunky, unfortunately, and I don't think it ever really got used or expanded upon. I'd love something like that for runes as well, my ultimate pie-in-the-sky dream would be a runic system you could string together to make streams of effects happen, like constructing a sentence or computer code, but I agree that such a thing is highly unlikely.

You could also point out that such tactical knowledge would be an assumed part of being a rogue, that might help. It'd be really strange if a class's training or experience didn't involve how to utilize their tools, and for rogues that includes waiting until your enemy is facing the other guy so you can stick them in the kidney, or equivalent organ.

You could also talk with this person and try to get a sense for what they do and don't consider metagaming. With luck you can maybe soften their stance a little bit. At minimum it'd give everyone a frame of reference for knowing when to expect this player to act contrary to how you'd expect.

It is weird to me how the actual flaming rune doesn't have a tradition (it's just "Magical") whereas Atryl, Rune of Fire is Primal. My understanding of Runesmith magic is "there exists extremely durable magic that can be used by anybody, as is illustrated by weapon and armor runes, the Runesmith is the person who works with this kind of magic and would be the person who discovers new property runes to put on items, in case they came up with a particularly good idea."

Not something I expect them to implement, but this started me thinking that it'd be cool if, instead of traditions, each of the runes was tied to an essence. Atryl would be a Material rune, for example, instead of a Primal rune.

Then you could invoke multiple runes of different types to access tradition-specific abilities, like triggering Atryl and Oljinex, a Material and Mental rune, to trigger your Arcane tradition abilities. You could still have the oppositional feats, as well, assuming you pick them and then trigger a Material and Spiritual rune, or a Mental and Vital rune.

Biggest issue there is the confusion of similar-sounding traits, given that mental, spirit, and vitality are damage types and tied to other effects, and it's also possible you'd wind up with lopsided representation of certain essences. Material is ridiculously broad compared to the other three, for example.

I don't think it'd take much to port it back at all. Honestly this trait sounds like a codifying and shortening of the text, "you may use your burrow, fly, or swim speeds if you possess any of those movement types," or however it tends to get written into various feats.

I'm super alongside this, as well. Traversal sounds like it's going to mostly serve to cut down on text repetition, like how Dedication was altered to include the special rule for archetypes; I super love text being cleaned up and streamlined.
Granted, it's another trait to add to the pile, and not everyone's going to love that, but I am definitely on board.

Just to be clear: Rituals in PF2 are where many "necromancer" effects, like create undead, reincarnate, rest eternal, call spirit, and resurrect, exist instead of in the spell lists.

Dr. Frankenstein, in PF2 terms, had a critical failure ("Something goes horribly wrong—an evil spirit possesses the body, the body transforms into a special kind of undead, or some worse fate befalls the target.") when performing a (non-standard, Stasian tech-based) resurrect ritual...

I'd say Frankenstein more crit failed at their checks at being a new dad, myself.

Also, I'm not sure Frankenstein would be a necromancer. The Beast of Lepidstadt, the closest analog we have to Frankenstein's Monster, was created by Count Alpon Caromarc, who is an alchemist, not any sort of caster.
I'm also pretty certain that, given a lot of the grounding Pathfinder's setting has in the occult practices and pseudo-science tropes of Victorian England, along with various fantasy and sci fi pulps, married to more typical D&D-esque fantasy, that the distinction between "true" magic and magical-seeming occult science is an important one for the setting.

Eh, you see, we say that all the time, but then I read a novel of theirs like Godsrain and we got cannibalism, despair and body horror. It's not that simple, the developers have reigned in some of the darkest stuff from the start of the setting, but plenty of really dark stuff is still happening.

Godsrain is going to be my exhibit A when someone asks where all the dark went in Pathfinder's setting. There were times I had to put the book down for a bit. I mean, the location for the climax alone is a good indicator that the grim isn't gone.

Loving everything I'm hearing. Thanks muchly, Starfriends. Still sad that I couldn't participate in the playtest, but I suppose there's still time to re-read the book and submit some feedback.

Really looking forward to seeing how guns and other equipment are buffed and rejiggered. I'd honestly be totally fine with SF equipment being above the power curve for a PF game. Also glad to hear operative is being reigned in a lil bit.

If that's true, then wouldn't that also have applied to using the item previously?

I could see an argument that catalysts are folded into the "Costs and Loci" rules, where you just need it on your person to cast a spell, but it's definitely far from ironclad.

Don't forget Thief Rogues getting to add their DEX to Damage on Unarmed Attacks. That was also a huge buff they got in the Remaster just because.

I legitimately thought this was how thief always worked, TBH. It took reading through people breaking down Remaster changes online to find out I'd been reading it wrong the whole time.

I'm loving the Runesmith!

A bigger selection of runes (and maybe getting some at every 4th level rather than every eighth) and it might well be a suitable replacement for my beloved Occultist class.

I always saw the thaumaturge as the new occultist, myself.

At first I thought this thread's title was "Make Thralls Stinky," and thought that was a weird idea. Then I read the actual post.

... And now I'm thinking about actually making stinky thralls, and it gets less weird the more I think about it.

I've still been thinking about this, and now I low key hope we get something that lets us do this as a debuff in the final release. A spell called Putrifaction, perhaps, where you destroy a thrall and enemies around it need to make saves or become Sickened.

Yeah, the date being next to the errata is really, really helpful, especially now that there are multiple printings of books and two semi-editions out in the wild.

Yeah, that's a really cool idea.

Also, thinking about it, I'm now surprised this isn't also a ritual. Making a haunt feels a lot like a spookier version of making a rune trap.