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Rules question for the Plague Bringer Ratfolk Alchemist archetype... it doesn't seem to be RAW, but I'm wondering if swift alchemy should technically work when applying disease to a weapon using the effects of a plague vial. Otherwise it always requires a standard action to apply, which seems terribly limiting, especially for higher levels. Is this just an oversight, am I reading it too literally, or should it always require a standard action?
Spring Attack Question: I have a rogue/shadow Dancer in a high level campaign. I've been using this tactic: 1: Partial move with spring attack
This lets me make a sneak attack every round. There doesn't appear to be any restriction with how many stealth checks you can make in a given round, it's just based on the action types you use. Since spring attack lets you split your move, I don't see any real reason why you couldn't make the two stealth checks. Thoughts?
I like it. THANKS BROSEPH!! \m/
Just throwing this out there: I actually like the new Magus class, in spite of all the whining and complaining I've seen. But this thread isn't about the magus, it's about the arcane archer. I like what they did to improve the arcane archer, but it still doesn't stack up compared to some other classes. How would people feel if the bow enchantments that the Arcane Archer got stacked and progressed like the new Magus class? Two of my DM's have already signed off on the idea with a great deal of enthusiasm, so I think it has some serious merit. My initial thought would be to grant a +1 bonus per two levels (1, 3, 5, 7, 9),let the +1 bonuses stack with magic weapons up till +5 like the Magus, and give a selection of features and powers applicable to bows that can be added in. Anyone else like this idea?
I think that Animal Companions constitute a special case. It's even mentioned in the core PRPG that companions can have their INT boosted.
Well, fortunately my elf is somewhat on the clever side, so all should be fine from that standpoint ;) That sounds like the best way to handle this vague rules gap. I recall from core 3.5 that extra stat points equated to extra tricks, and although it's not spelled out (that I've found) it seems implied that you get three tricks per INT point. The understanding language part did throw me off a bit; I may have to run this by my DM. It makes sense to me, in a cinematic fashion, so I can probably get it allowed. With the Ogre analogy though, keep in mind that Ogres are also sorely lacking in WIS, not just INT. Most of the companion animals are rather wise, so at least they can avoid obvious threats.
So is it a definite that an animal companion that gets bumped to an INT of 3 can understand a language? How does having an INT of 3 affect an animal companion as far as skill tricks go? Do the tricks just 'go away' since the companion can now understand a language? This seems like a peculiar loophole to me. I'm sure the intent was not to have animal companions suddenly become magical beasts, but I'm also sure that tricks shouldn't vanish and become irrelevant as soon as you get the INT to 3 or higher since they can understand spoken word. Would a smarter animal be able to learn more tricks or something? This feels like a gap in the rules, so I'm just sort of looking for clarification. My ranger is about to level and get a smarter than average pet, so this has become somewhat important for the campaign...
Pretty strong idea. I'd still like to see a little more option diversity, perhaps make trapfinding be part of the discovery abilities, although I don't know if that fits either. So far every single person I've seen discuss this class has indicated that the discoveries are far too few, and would like to see them structured a bit more like the rogue talents. As it stands, some of the loose testing I've done with several alchemist builds have been pretty weak.
I just want to chime in on my support of the split path idea for the summoner after Dags pointed me to this thread. One alternative I've been floating is the use of a summoning "pool" that can be used to cast various summon monster spells and also to boost the potency of those SLA's. For example, spending an extra point to increase the duration, or another point to decrease the cast time. It might be viable to have an Eidelon focused summoner that gets the collection of evolution points to mutate the Eidelon into whatever they want, and then an alternate that gets a pool of daily summoning points to power their SLA and any available mods to just focus on summoning up an army of smaller critters.
It looks like I have at least our DM (who's the only one who really matters, quite frankly) behind the idea of a summoning "pool" similar to the ki pool to summon critters, so we may wind up testing a version of that class out in our game to see if it works or not. We probably won't have a chance to play till next year though :(
Am I the only one that has a conceptual problem with making unlimited glass vials per day for no cost? I mean... in most fantasy settings small glass vials are expensive to make (glass being expensive to make as well). Well, they could be clay or some sort of ceramics, or even a weighted paper packet of volatile powders. There are lots of options besides glass, I'd think.
I'm not crazy about the idea of completely killing the Eidelon mechanics off, but a few of the guys in my game group have mentioned that the class does seem a bit disjointed between the Eidelon and the Summoning. Perhaps it could be a class choice feature, similar to how a ranger chooses their nature's bond ability.
Ya know thats interesting 6 caster's, six non casters and 5 hybrids. Although alchemist could be a hybrid as well I'd probably make an alchemist a hybrid, but yeah, listed that way it seems pretty well balanced.
Meh, that kills it for me. I'm not even playing a summoner right now, but I like the Eidelon idea. Just needs a little tweaking to balance the power out for the multi attack thing.
My group does wind up with a lot of spell-less rangers. We usually swap in a feat when a ranger would normally get a new spell level. The one I'm playing right now has some interesting features that follow along with combat style ability; normal feats that drop a prerequisite, but restrict him to light/medium armor, like mounted archery in my case.
I'm sort of discussing an idea I had about the SLA in another thread, so I'll reprint it here in what seems like the main update thread: I think it would be interesting if the SLA were converted to a mechanic similar to a ki pool, where the summoner would get 1 use per day per level + their CHA mod. As the summoner levels up, they'll learn abilities that would allow them to spend extra summons per day to enhance what they can summon. As an example: +1 summon:
+2 summon:
These are just a few options I can think of, there could be more. They would function very similarly to metamagic feats, in that they would restrict the highest level of summon spell the summoner could call up. So a 9th level summoner, who can use their SLA as Summon Monster 5, would be restricted to summon monster 4 if they add a +1 level modification to their summons. Alternately, you could restrict the maximum number of "summons" uses a summoner could use at one time. Perhaps the summoner could cast a summon with up to an extra +1 mod every three levels, so at level three they could start enhancing their SLA at the cost of burning up summons per day a little faster. Anyway, I think this is a kind of cool idea, and might be a good way to distinguish a summoner further from a plain conjurer, other than having a nifty Eidolon pet.
Hmm, yeah, the 20th level ability does indicate that. Good point. I see shield ally as more of the Eidolon protecting his owner/summoner than something that would prompt the summoner to wade into the front lines. Ok, I'm less committed to the 1/2 BAB now that I've had a chance to discuss it a bit. What about the SLA though? How do you feel about modifying the ability and giving it more options based on a mechanic similar to a ki pool or stunning fist use type feature? That way it doesn't start off overpowered, but gives the summoner some greater versatility later on and significantly distinguishes them from conjurers as being, well, summoners.
the only way to justify giving them the lower bab, ect would be to give them full spellcasting. Perhaps, although I think keeping their summon SLA stronger would justify it and fit the concept of the class better (well, my concept anyway, other people certainly seem to have different takes on it, which is cool). I'd like to see the SLA increase in uses per day by level, and give them the extra options to enhance the duration or speed of the summon as I outlined in my first post.
this is the worst idea, i love the eidolon being what ever floats out of the players head, it makes it unique. if it's just a list, you better do a lot to make it worth not getting 9th level spells, cuz i could build a pretty damn good druid summoner. Yeah, I'm not keen on that list idea at all either.
Understood. I just don't think that a summoner should be built along the lines of a bard, but rather more of a mage type. A class like the alchemist fits the mid BAB simply because they have to get up close and personal and fling their potions and bombs and such, so it makes sense for them. There's nothing in the summoner class abilities that are even remotely linked to BAB or being able to hit better or use armor; it's all about getting other critters to do it for you. I could accept light armor for a summoner, since their style of magic is more innate and less strict (but also less versatile) than a sorcerer or wizard.
I agree with a lot of these suggestions. As mentioned in another thread, I like the idea of moving some set class features into discoveries and making the discovery progression every even level. I like the idea of changing a lot of the abilities to an "alchemical" bonus type, which would allow some stacking of buffs. That might be a little overdone, as allowing stat bonuses to stack can lead to something becoming overpowered, but it's definitely something to consider. Chugging potions faster does seem like it might be fitting for the class as well. The class does seem like it should require prep time to set up potions and bomb ahead of time, giving them a slight restriction, but forcing the bomb throwing to always be what is, basically, a full round action is a pain in the ass. It might be good to at least let the Alchemist hold a bomb's magical charge over multiple rounds (and only one bomb at a time) so they're not so restricted.
My group has been testing a low level summoner in our mix, and I've got a few observations or ideas. I feel the summoner should be 1/2 BAB; their focus seems to be to use their eidolon or summoned critters to fight. Having mid grade BAB doesn't really seem appropriate at all. In fact, it's just weird that they were given a mid grade BAB since their focus is to keep themselves out of combat and use minions at all costs. I mean, that seems to be the very definition of a summoner. Their SLA to summon critters should stay somewhat buffed. At the least it should keep the 1 minute per level duration, although I do have an alternative below. The tweaks to the Eidolon seem pretty good, so I don't really have any suggestions there. But again, the summoner should be somewhat weak. They should keep their minions close to protect themselves. This balances out the strength and versatility of the Eidolon by making a vulnerable point and forcing the summoner to sort of think tactically and keep themselves safe. ... A possible improvement I had considered was that the summoner could burn extra uses of their SLA to improve the summon ability. The available improvements could be boosted at certain level intervals. For example: 1 use = normal spell Possibly at Level 5+
Possibly at Level 10+
Alternately (or in addition to) this could cap the level of summon spell the summoner could pull off. For example, if I boost my SLA summon to a standard action by burning an extra use per day, it also reduces the level of summon spell I can use by 1. If I enhance it with both duration and cast speed knock the spell level down by 2. So a level 9 summoner, who can cast level 5 summon monster, could cast level 4 as a standard action, or level 4 with an enhanced duration, or level 3 with both standard and enhanced. At high levels it may be possible to get the summon down to a move or swift action with large adjustments; a move action might be +3 or +4 (costing 4 extra uses and dropping the spell level by 4), and swift might be even higher (if available at all; swift could be a deal breaker, it's just a thought). I'm not sure how I feel about how many SLA summons can be active at any one time or not. One active at a time may be fine, or again, you could force a summoner to burn extra uses per day to have multiples active. FOr example, if you've got one active, a second requires more energies, so adds +1 use and, again, diminishes the highest level summon spell the summoner can pull off. ... This is just an off the top of my head idea. The Eidolon seems to have taken too much of the focus for the class, in my mind. They should be good at summoning monsters as well. There could be plenty of tweaks to it, this just seems like it might keep the summoner flavor going rather than just the "Eidolon pet owner" class.
I admit I kind of like this idea. A discovery every even level and moving some of the set abilities into discoveries would be a good change. That might make the class progression feel very much like a rogue with their class features, but I don't really think that's necessarily a bad thing. I do like the idea of more focused "Jekyll/Hyde", Poisoner, or Explosives oriented alchemists, rather than a forced hodge-podge of all three.
I guess they were never common enough in my game before now to look up all the rules in regards to them. Thanks for the link. I hope Paizo includes some rules on them in the Beta for easy reference. You don't scare me. ^_^ Well, ok, maybe a little. I'm still pretty sure I could have gotten out of there even if he saw it coming.
And would also mean you can wield a Two-Handed weapon and make an unarmed strike as an off-hand attack (say with a knee or headbutt). Of course, said Monk still takes huge penalties for TWF. And to tag along with Russ, the you can make an extra off-hand attack with TWF, taking all the normal penalties, in addition to flurry of blows (again, you still take penalties for all this).Wanted to make sure folks are clear what that means: it means that you can throw right and left punches with no penalties (and no reduction in damage). It doesn't mean you get an EXTRA off-hand attack for free. I must admit, this seems like it might be a nice perk for the Monk, and allow them to be even more distinct in their combat abilities if they could pull off nifty tricks like that. In our game I think we figured that, since the monk can have his fists treated as weapons, weapon-type feats should be able to apply.
That's kind of the point where I don't think this Monk build is all that bad. Yeah, he hits hard, but my sorcerer is regularly dropping 15d6 fireballs (empowered) in battle, or triple scorching ray blasts. I think he's right in line with the rest of our party for damage. he's just very flashy and unorthodox, so I think it gets a lot of attention when he says "I make a sixty foot leap and axe kick the golem in the skull twice, shattering him to pieces with my massive damage".
Input...? To be honest, there has been some power creep in 3.5 with the new base classes; look at the beguiler and others. Of course, some were more miss than hit, like the useless Complete Warrior Samurai or the watered down 3.5 non-oriental Wu-Jen. I like the idea of the 3.5 Warlock, although the bloodlines of sorcerers and the addition of more at-will abilities for the wizard has made some inroads into the Warlock's current mini-niche.
I guess they were never common enough in my game before now to look up all the rules in regards to them. Thanks for the link. I hope Paizo includes some rules on them in the Beta for easy reference. You're just bitter because I escaped your big nasty demon and you couldn't do jack about it ^____^ I agree about counterspelling being sort of weaksauce though. As things in 3.5 stand, you've got to jack yourself up with some buff spells to improve counterspelling to make it worth the delay. Oh, I'm also not all that worried about the CMB thing being set at 15. That actually seems like a fair number. When we were back in my campaign it worked out pretty well. That being said, the +2 bonus you get for the feats may be the part that's too low. I'm still not sure.
Have you actually used those feats in play with those bonuses before making this claim? As I recall flying kick adds 1d12 to damage but uses a standard action as an attack. I'm not sure what battle jump does, but I would wait till you've actually seen a monk that uses them, heck this is playtest time, have your friend take the monk in that direction and see how he stacks up to the party wizard in damage potential I'm in the OP's play group. here's how our friend, the Monk of leaping goodness, plays out. Flying kick adds +1d12 damage on a charge with an unarmed attack. Battle jump (out of unapproachable east) says you can execute a charge with a drop of at least 5 feet above your opponent, so long as it's not more than 30 feet and you're not flying or something else goofy. On top of that, if you hit, you deal double weapon/unarmed damage. Add in powerful charge and greater powerful charge: +2d6 on a charge for damage. THEN to put the cherry on the sundae of aerobatic nuttiness, add in two-weapon pounce from the PHB2. This is the figures we come out with: Monk jumps, and with his berserk jump mod, he can easily get a 15 foot vertical standing leap. This puts him five feet over most foes, so suddenly he's treated as charging. This adds 1d12 + 2d6 to his 2d6 unarmed strike, of which he gets TWO, because of his two-weapon pounce. Even though he's not using two weapons per se, his fists more or less count. Oh, he's got an STR of 16 as well. The battlejump also doubles his base weapon damage. So when he jumps at an enemy, he gets two attacks: Attack 1: 4d6 + 6 + 2d6 + 1d12 (13-58) - main hand
On top of this, he can add in fiery fist if he doesn't use Ki to boost his jump, slapping an extra 1d6 fire damage on each strike. Now, the DM ruled that the flying kick and powerful charge damage should only apply to the first attack of the two, which most of use are OK with. It's still pretty impressive for a Monk though; especially since he can make this attack from over sixty to seventy feet away, and can bypass any obstacle or foe in his path with a tremendous leap. Personally, I think it's awesome, but it aggravates our DM when the monk makes a sixty foot horizontal leap and splatters the evil wizard by bypassing all of his minions. And then, of course, he jumps away before they can converge on him. ^_^
I'm still not so sure it's all THAT bad. A fighter with a good selection of feats can still deal more damage than the afore mentioned battle-jumping Monk. Of course, I don't think Battle Jump is OGL, being out of an obscure Forgotten Realms book, so I don't think Paizo can really do much about it. Jump is still a weird action...it's not the same as, say, stealth or other acrobatics checks. It's the one skill in the game that doesn't really get too insane when you slap a +20 or more on it. It just lets you move a little further. At least we're all in agreement that the style of it works. ^_^
1) I really like the idea of having a warlock version of "practiced spellcaster". They're a difficult class to do any multiclassing with, currently. 2) I like the idea of having the DR be 'bloodline' based. 3) The fast healing ability is weaksauce. I'd say grant it either more uses per day, or allow the warlock to have some sort of long-term healing improvement. Something like recovering X HP's per hour of rest. That removes it from being useful in combat, but I think it fits the flavor of the character better. Alternately, give them constant fast healing, but don't grant it till much higher levels. 4) Adding an invocation to boost the blast to d8's isn't a bad idea. I'd make it a fairly high level though. Either that or make it a feat; some third party publishers have a feat to boost rogue sneak attack damage to d8's instead of d6's. 5) I'm inclined to think the Warlocks need a few extra invocations, or alternately, more little flavor abilities like the sorcerers and wizards now get. This may be handled using the extra invocation feat, which should be available earlier. The feat should always grant them at least a least invocation, and should be available from level 1. 6) I like the idea of adding a "rapid fire" blast shape type ability that lets them use iterative attacks with their blasts, but at a large range penalty, perhaps dropping it to thirty feet. 7) They should be a d8 HD, no arguments, if we're going to get on board with the PF BAB <-> HD linking. 8) Not sure how I feel about the skill points. I'm inclined to leave it at 2, personally. They already get mid grade BAB, can wear armor, and some decent abilities that can be used at will all the time. That being said, they don't have the same firepower as a wizard or sorcerer at similar levels, although they are more consistent about it. 9) Fell flight is slow. The speed it grants should scale by level. It should at least wind up matching the fly spell at higher levels. There should also be a larger array of invocations available, but that'll take a bit more time and thought to sort out.
I'd think any class with a Ki pool of some sort would stack levels, the same way that any class with improved uncanny dodge stacks levels to avoid being flanked. I'd also agree that the Monk should get their class level in their Ki pool, not half, especially with all the new Ki powers they have, some of which use more than one ki point.
Yeah, that is annoying. It's one reason why I generally detest 3rd party published materials. That's actually a strong compliment for Paizo. Third party stuff has to be good for a DM like me to consider it, nevermind be happy with it.
I'm of the opinion that now that the core classes don't suck and actually give nifty perks at high levels, PrC dipping will be cut down a bit. Personally, I've never been too concerned with it. The flexibility and wide array of options have always been a good thing, I think, although it does have the potential to punish non min-maxers. Again, the strength of the core classes now should mitigate that problem.
Yeah, it was fine, it was just a problem when they started making them stack with multiple spells sacrificed. That is why I thought it should be restricted to only 1 spell can be sacrificed. Oh weird, I never even picked up on that, I had just assumed it was a one-spell at a time thing. Interesting. Well, back on the topic at hand, how does this PF feat get a boost so it sucks less? Conversely, is it really that bad? It's not that far of from weapon specialization, in that it grants +1 damage and makes the weapon magic, instead of a plain +2 damage. Of course, this feat doesn't lead to a tree of extra feats like weapon spec. does...
this is an interesting discussion but most prestige classes that improve casting abilities only aplly those improvements to spell not special abilities. This is a good point. So is the specific wording of "caster level" rather than class level for Wizards intentional, or an oversight? Sorcerer bloodlines, for example, say class level (I think)... At the same time though, you do get your extra spell slots and such from cleric domains per caster level, not class level. Is that what they were going for? <- *head explodes*
It strikes me as kind of tough to make a heal check in the middle of combat. And being forced to do this makes bleed damage a nightmare; either you keep going and bleed out, or you stop and provoke attacks from everything nearby to heal yourself. It lets even a very low level rogue do tremendous damage or almost permanently off-balance an enemy as soon as they land a sneak attack. I'm not saying get rid of bleed, just that freely adding 1 point of bleed per sneak die without a tradeoff is too much.
Count me in as another one of the "don't muck with DR too much" crowd. The very reason it changed from 3.0 was because an extra +1 trumped everything else, always. A +2 magic dagger was dramatically better than a +1 magic dagger because of those DR 10/+2's out there. It meant that half of the magic items you got, even if they had a nifty ability, were useless at high levels fighting high DR ratings. And forget silver or cold iron; who cared about that crap! The current DR system works out fairly well. I'd hate to return to the days of the 3.0 DR system in any capacity: it sucked. The current system works well with requiring special materials to overcome foes. It's boring if all you ever need is your +4 greatsword of ultimate doom.
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