What Wraithstrike said. A +1 sword is a +1 sword. Making me jump through hoops to get it doesn't make it any more special. It just leaves me vaguely annoyed.
I'm honestly wondering why a CG Magus and LG Silver Dragon would be compelled to fight their Black Blades...given that said blades are supposed to share their wielders alignment. Overall, your GM sounds like he's being a dick about things...and kind of sucks at conflict resolution. Paladins falling is there as an interesting story hook when both larties are in agreement, not for a GM to use as part of a hissyfit over how he thinks things should go.
What is bloat? I keep hearing about it, but I've yet to actually see it.
Do you have an option to play as an energetic bunny cop and delightful fox conman?
Do you want them to? I mean, I generally just ignore the whole secret identity aspect and use the Vigilante as Fighter+ or Rogue+.
Ultimate Booty Shakin' It's all about getting down with your bad self, and busting out the sickest dance moves Golarion's ever seen.
I once had a wizard who wore full imperial regalia to adventure. Of course, he was both rich and crazy.
"Exterminatus" It's the only way to be sure.
I'm a fan of letting people play what they like. After all, the point is to have fun. If I was going to ban races, it would mostly likely be the core races that got the axe. I love LotR and all, but "Yet another Northern European fantasyland with standard fantasy races" just bores me to tears at this point.
Also it still is on topic i think. Some people are making claims about fighter power levels, and i am trying to show why they are incorrect.That's what the discussion came down to, really. I think it's actually fairly simple to make it so a Fighter can have narrative influence. It's not hard, and they're based in class features. Not as much as magic, but enough to be relevant. I guess the whole discussion was why take a Fighter rather than other things. I say it's easy to make a Fighter that works with and around the party, covering a certain martial, or general party, deficiencies they have. Just as well they can make armor, be an excellent military strategist (Profession: Soldier), kill things well (Very well with warrior spirit), be a partial face, and be a boon to a party that can't be mimicked by other martials. I think I've pretty much covered why by this point. Nothing you just mentioned is unique to the fighter though. Any martial can kill things well, most have more skill points to play around with for things like profession or diplomacy, or in the case of the Paladin have an actual use for a high charisma beyond diplomacy (and get as a class skill to boot). Everything the Fighter brings to the table can be mimicked by another class. A great deal of it can be mimicked by a class feature. Or a spell.
The cleric can absorb basically as much as a fighter at any one time, but it can increase it's own survivability.I don't think that's true. Like... even slightly. The difference between a d8 and d10 HD is an average of 1 HP/level. And the fighter doesn't have channels or heals.
Pathfinder is a dice game. Even if you do go out of your way to avoid instadeath, sometimes the players just have some really terrible luck. I've seen parties snatch defeat from the jaws of almost certain victory more than once. And while corruptions are mechanically both a boon and a penalty, if the player doesn't want it, it is entirely a penalty for them. I'm not saying it's automatically a terrible idea. I'd personally probably enjoy it loads. But there are players who would absolutely hate it. I'd rather not force it on them, even if the rest of the group were on board.
To be fair, the higher level you go, the more likely you are to encounter a situation where an unfortunate crit or flubbed save means death. Dying because you made a heroic sacrifice is cool and meaningful. Dying because you rolled a one against disintegrate just kind of sucks. Again, in the right campaign where everyone agreed to this before hand, or if it was floated by the player first and they liked the it, this could be an awesome idea. Just kind of dumping it on someone out of the blue just because "death has to be meaningful" is sort of a dick move, and the player would be justified in telling the GM "no". Remember, Pathfinder is an RPG, the goal is for everyone to have a good time.
Chalk up another vote for Path of War. Absolutly fantastic system.
You're an Int 7 fighter without any knowledge training, but sure, go ahead and wrack your brains trying to remember an obscure piece of arcane lore that you could never have conceivably learned And this is relevant to Bards and Bardic Knowledge how?
You cannot make an untrained Knowledge check with a DC higher than 10. and may make all Knowledge skill checks untrained. The wording is what makes it work. Normal characters cannot even attempt a knowledge check if they are untrained and the DC is above 10. Bards can attempt any knowledge check even if they are untrained.
Also, the AC granted by this feat to a two-handed fighter can also be matched by simply taking quick draw and using a quick draw shield.Theoretically - but I don't think any GM would actually allow that since # of free actions are entirely within his discretion. If it's less than 5 they're screwing over archers, drawing an arrow is a free action.
Like I said, niche case, but it is a consideration. And there are still my other points. Honestly, you're only looking at this from an "add shield to a build that wouldn't have one" and ignoring what it can do for someone who was already planning on a shield. Yes, it does nothing for a shield bash build, but that's it's own beast. For someone going srait sword and board, you lose out 1 AC compared to a heavy shield and gain the ability to use your hand for things. Holding a short duration potion for use in a surprise round, or even the first round, wands, alchemical substances (even at higher levels I like to carry a few vials of alchemist's fire or vials of acid for use against swarms/regen), Clerics can hold their divine focus without losing their shield bonus, and once again dismounted lancers get good use out of this.
Be does make a valid point. Sword and Board users could use this feat to add a contingency buckler to their weapon arm, and retain it's benefits should they ever be deprived of their main shield (sword bashing w/out improved shield bash, sundering, ect). A somewhat niche case, but valid. Or they could simply use a buckler and keep a free hand for holding potions, wands, an alternative weapon, ect. Or lance and Board users who no longer have to choose between using valuable actions to switch weapons or losing their shield bonus every time they dismount.
"Players: Feats kind of suck, and many are under-powered or require far too many prerequisites. Paizo: We hear you, have some feats that are actually pretty cool and worthwhile. Players: OMG OP PLZ NERF!" And this is why we can't have nice things.
Define "Classic Fantasy", because Ashton Clark Smith, Lord Dunsany, Moorcock, Edgar Rice Burroughs and Lovecraft could all get pretty bizarre. Heck, even Tolkien was fairly weird for his, lots of non-human heroes and he invented Hobbits.
Well, you've mentioned that you want a "caveman" feel to the campaign, but you haven't really shown how nerfing the Barbarian actually helps with that. Heck, if anything I'd ditch the Fighter completely and have the Barbarian/Ranger be the main martial classes, especially as they have the skill support to work in a primative, self reliant setting. (Admittedly I'd ditch the Fighter anyway, but that's just me.)
The best AC is dead enemies. But seriously, 31 by level 5 is a bit much.
Mystic Bolt is one class feature among several. Including 6th level int based, prepared sor/wiz spellcasting. Something that by itself probably makes the Warlock stronger than the base Vigilante.
For transit, at least, I like to use a steel husky toolbox, and glue a hobby magnet under the mini's base. Does a pretty good job of keeping things from bumping about.
1. Arcane Mark, also 2. Average of 60 damage, not really that much by the time you reach level 10. Especially considering how easily countered it is. SR has a chance to negate it, energy resistance/immunity are fairly common at that point, either innately or via spells. And is still less damage potential than the Barbarian or pretty much any Archer can put out. One of the main problems the Magus has is confirmation bias, that is to say that the times the Magus preforms well tend to stick in peoples memory better than the times that it did average or below average.
Another thing, a Belier Devil, an obese three headed slug monster has a higher constitution score than either an Erinyes or a Succubus. The latter two probably fit the criteria for "attractive" far better than Sluggy McFatleech.
Okay, question, how well do you think your average model would do in an endurance trial. I don't think she, or he for that matter, would very good, because they go for attractiveness, not fitness. A number of them even engage in rather unhealthy practices to maintain those looks, especially in regards to diet. We're talking, infertility, osteoporosis and kidney damage here. That's not a high constitution, quite the opposite I'd say.
I don't see how my idea is a punishment. I think you are just using unnecessarily emotive language.I'm really not, as demonstrated most ably by Milo, Aratrok and Avh. Probably better than I could have done so myself. The most irksome thing being that it is possible to nerf casters without making playing them an exercise in frustration. I even mentioned two systems to do so, SoP and Psionics. Both very fun, very elegant and a definite decrease in caster power, albeit in different ways. Fair enough. Thematic preferences vary from person to person. Though, as has been pointed out, your suggestion isn't really unpredictable.
I don't see how my idea is a punishment. I think you are just using unnecessarily emotive language. I'm really not, as demonstrated most ably by Milo, Aratrok and Avh. Probably better than I could have done so myself. The most irksome thing being that it is possible to nerf casters without making playing them an exercise in frustration. I even mentioned two systems to do so, SoP and Psionics. Both very fun, very elegant and a definite decrease in caster power, albeit in different ways.
Making casters play "wheel of competence" isn't reducing their raw power, it's just slapping the player with a ridiculous punishment for playing a caster. Getting to contribute once or twice over the course of several encounters, then sitting on your hands simply isn't fun. There are perfectly reasonable and valid ways to reduce caster dominance that doesn't rely on punishing the player. Remove or nerf problem spells, use alternate systems like Psionics or Spheres of Power. Just don't take it out on the player. And no, that matches no typical fantasy wizard I've ever heard of.
I personally find the Core Races to overly rooted in a single man's interpretation of fantasy. Tolkien's works were decent, but he is not the be all end all of fantasy. There are so many fascinating myths, legends and other works of fantasy modern and ancient that restricting things to his vision of Northern European Mythology just feels so anemic. Doubly so, considering that prior to Tolkien's writing, non-human protagonists essentially did not exist, making the Fellowship of the Ring pretty much a party of freaks by default (Elf Prince, Dwarf Lord, 80% of the adventuring Hobbit population in several centuries, freaking Angel, and a man whose ancestry includes Elves, gods, superhumans and who is secretly the True King. The only semi-normal person in the whole blasted affair is Borimir, and he just so happens to be the only member to permanently die). I liked LoTR, I just don't want to replay it yet again. If I have to traverse another variation of Not!England in the company of a group of Officially Sanctioned Standard Fantasy Races I may just join the BBEG to put the whole thing out of my misery.
You make a good point. That's when you start seeing casters create their own pocket realities, so martial deeds really should be of equivalent magnitude.
I've always hated that theory of "balancing", because yeah, now everyone has a role, but one person is still bending reality over his knee while the other is a glorified meat shield. Absolutely agree that martials should be able to do crazy things. Really, once you've reached mid level, you should not be constrained by notions of realism. Aragorn is cool and all, but he should stop being a benchmark for martial characters past level 6. Higher levels should be looking at things like The Song of Roland or The Epic of Gilgamesh for inspiration.
Forgetting that shooting through any other creature's space gives your target soft cover. And then complaining about how strong archery is.
Any class you want. Remember, character class is not character concept. All a class is is a bundle of mechanical abilities. While these can certainly tend towards certain concepts, but any class could be from a noble background. A barbarian, for example, could represent a huge, bluff nobleman more at home on extravagant hunting expeditions than his throne, and noted for his legendary anger. Think a young Robert Baratheon. Clerics? The term Lords Temporal and Spiritual exists for a reason. The Church was a popular destination for sons with little chance to inherit, or to prevent their inheritance in the case of gavelkind style successions. Not to mention the existence of Prince-Bishops who ruled secular territory in addition to their pulpits (check out the history of the HRE. Places like Mainz or Cologne). And even today Catholic Cardinals are given the title Prince of the Church. Bards have such wonderful class features for the nobility. They're proficient with Long swords and Rapiers, weapons long associated with the upper crust. Bardic Knowledge is perfect for someone who's dabbled in various scholastic topics. Not a true scholar, but able to converse intelligently on a bewildering number of topics. Archetypes like the Arcane duelist, granting increasing armor proficiency, makes for a more "knightly" approach to the class. And let's face it, the Saint Crispin's day speech is probably the most famous use of a perform (orator) based Inspire Courage in the Western World. Or my personal favorite, William de Normandie's personal minstrel Taillefer, a knight-troubadour who lead the first Norman cavalry charge at Hastings, tossing and catching his lance and singing verses from the Song of Roland as he went. A wizard can be the rough scrabble apprentice of some hedge-mage, true. Or he could be the scion of a mighty noble house, tutored in the arcane arts by at the finest magical academies in the world, using a scepter (rod) as a bonded object. Or a Magus, tutored in the arts arcane and martial, equally at home staring down a summoned demon with imperious confidence, or crossing blades with the dreaded Black Knight of Conningvale. Even a Rogue could be less a cut-purse, and more a bored courtier, who's turned to larcancy to escape the crushing ennui of the King's court. Or, more heroically, donning a mask and blade to sneak the innocent out of the grasp of the tyrannical revolutionary regime, a la the Scarlet Pimpernel. As a final note, given that class isn't concept I'd avoid Aristocrat. Aside from the name, it has nothing inherently "noble" about it, and could even be used to represent completely non-noble individuals, such as the scion of a wealthy merchant family, landed gentry (property, but not noble) or even the average citizens of more cosmopolitan cities and states (it actually strikes a good midpoint between commoner, who mainly represent more rural or lower class individuals, and the expert who really represents more of a full time scholar, or a non-magical minstrel/thief). Fluff like that is really better handled via backstory, or if you must have an in game representation, the use of traits or feats like Noble Scion.
Well, to begin with wealth by level , which indicates how much gear a player should have at any given level coupled with the magic item purchasing rules that make keeping up to date with magic items fairly easy for the first half of the game and Paizo removing the experience cost and reducing the difficulty of crafting explicitly to encourage people to craft items. There's also the way that suggested monster DC, AC and attack scale faster than class basis (even good saves) and ability bonus alone keep up with. Yes, players are supposed to fail at times. But those failures, especially at higher level, can be catastrophic if multiple people start failing at once. Good saves, are not by themselves good enough, and "you can dip Paladin" is not a solution. That assumes the character is LG, will remain LG, has a decent Cha score and that it makes thematic sense for that character to become a Paladin. One person being dominated is bad, but survivable. Then entire front line getting dominated is asking for a TPK. Let's take a step further, however, and address the specific rather than the general. In the proposal you outlined above, 1 stat every level, the player in question gets a total of 20 stat points. Compared to your current set up (1 stat point per 4 levels, two +6/+6 items) they come out ahead by a single stat point. In exchange for all their enhancement, deflection and normal stat boost items. This is a pretty poor deal from their end. Now, I'm not saying you can't make this system work, or that you couldn't have fun with it, but you're going to have to reevaluate every encounter against your party's ability to handle it. And given that CR is already more of a ballpark estimate than an exact science, you're making a lot of extra work for yourself, for little gain. If the magic items themselves are what you want to eliminate, again Unchained has a perfectly functional system that does just that, without impacting the characters' effectiveness. Alternatively, there are other, excellent systems out there which do not have magic items as a base assumption when determining challenge. I'm not trying to say you're doing it wrong, or having badwrongfun. I'm trying to say that you're doing it in a way that's going to create a lot of extra, unnecessary work for yourself.
I love Pathfinder. It's probably my favorite RPG. Does it have it's flaws? Yes, of course. Some of them are pretty glaring. But despite that, it's a fun game, and allows a broad array of character concepts and stories.
To be honest, I hope they do not do this, ever. Battle Clerics are still a thing.Still a thing? At my table battle clerics dominate Warpriests. And thisis the heart of the problem. The Warpriest is an amazing class, really it is. But the Cleric has the same BAB and 9th level spell casting.
Seemed to work for DBZ. No, but seriously, authors have the luxury of not having to deal with unlucky rolling. Death is cheap may not be the most epic thing in the world, but neither is Lancelot getting killed by random mook 218, especially if Lancelot ' player now has to sit out an hour. And please note, I say this as a player who tends to use character death as an opportunity to try out new character concepts unless the GM tells me that it would be harmful to the story.
My advice on making death meaningful: Don't. Death in stories is meaningful because the author has complete control of when and who dies, and because as an artistic endeavor meaning is part and parcel of the whole thing. Pathfinder is a game, where some bad luck can see a character dead pretty easily, and as a result death is cheap by design, because that really sucks. Not to mention all of the reasons Dekalinder and aboyd mentioned.
In my opinion, the unchained rogue has some other very nice goodies, and skills in general are somewhat weak. I think letting everyone have skill unlocks, but the rogue getting more/earlier strikes a fair compromise. I think I'm going to go: everyone gets to chose a number of skills equal to half their base skill points as favored skills, and can feat into more, while rogues also get their class feature unlocks and count as five point higher (ten at tenth level) for unlocks. Everyone can make use of them, but rogues are the best at it.
You're still wrong. To counter your anecdotal evidence, I submit my own: I dislike dumping stats, never dump beyond one stat to an 8, and rarely even then. So, yeah, not universal, not by a long shot. I happen to be playing in campaign right now with plenty of people acting like a$&!@#@'s in character, despite everyone having high charisma. And it's one of the best I've been in, with plenty great party interaction and roleplay. Everyone's having a grand old time. Because, unsurprisingly, being a fractious group does, in fact, have consequences. Such as not trusting another character enough to let them cast a buff spell on me, or doing something that the player knows is dumb, but doing it anyway because that's what the character would do. intra-party conflict is not bad, as long as everyone is on board. From the sound of it, your players are acting like jerks despite it clearly not being okay, and trying to justify it with low charisma. That's not the fault of charisma, anymore than people doing the same thing "because CN, lol" is the fault of the CN alignment. That's just your players (not the characters, the players) being a$&!@#@s
So, pertinent question, what God does this Paladin follow? Because at this point, both the "he's a criminal caught doing horrible things, kill him" and the "he's helpless and surrendering, don't kill him" camps are legitimate interpretations of Lawful Good. In this case it really depends on if the Paladin follows a God with a greater emphasis on punishing evil, or redeeming evil.
I've played a strength based melee kitsune bard before. Because AS are nice, but defying them can and does work. I also play Elven Magi all the time because of the con penalty. Elric, yo!
Depends, what enhancement bonus did Checkov give it?
I love options, options are great. They're also optional. As for dealing with the "dm control freak vs. player entitlement" issue, I've found the easiest solution is behave like a mature, rational human being instead of a control-freak or an entitled jerk:
It's amazing what a little respect, explaining, and a willingness to not always have things exactly as you want can do.
Bypassing a requirement and inflating CL beyond your own are two different things. But a +5 sword is, by definition a CL 15 item. A level 6 wizard, as per Diego Rossi's example can, theoretically, create a level +5 sword. Ergo, you can create an item with a higher caster level than your own. It just increases the DC by +5+X where X is the CL of the item.
Not really. This is only a problem at some tables. Most tables dont have a problem with the current ruleset, and the skill of the player is also a factor. A good player can do well with almost any class, so no this would not do a lot for game balance. You might also want to look at differences in play style. Another problem with this rule is what happens when people multiclass. It really just creates more problems, and solves none. I can still get a 20 int on 5 point buy. And, while I might suck in most other respects, I now have a very strong reason to try and break the game. Assuming I don't just walk.
A stated design goal of the crafting rules is they're meant to be easy skill wise. Being 'able' to make the items has never been an issue. Paying for them and having the time to craft them is the scarceness in that aspect of the game.Easy crafting DCs are not the problem. The problem is, by intending to make the crafting DCs easy, they have opened the possibility of making cheap magic items of levels above what players should have at their levels. There are alot of post with exemples of exploits, like: - At lvl 3, crafting +1 weapons for 2,300g at CL 20(and also most items). So it's really hard to dispel. How very exploitative. Still only a +1. - A wizard can craft a scroll of any spell he wishes to learn. Nope. Spell completion items cannot bypass spell requirements - A 3rd lvl wizard could craft a Candle of Raise Dead with DC 24 and 1,125gp. Good. Sometimes characters die early on, there should be a way to res them, and that's still quite a bit of money for a level 3. - At lvl 3, you can create a +5 Spellcraft Amulet with DC 15 for 1,250g, and with it soon a +10 for 5,000g and +15 for 11,250g. Where's he getting the money for the second and third one, precisely? There are some relatively cheap magic items that can solve big problems: - At lvl 5, a druid could craft a teleportation spoon. Again, where's the money coming from? Plus, that's a custom magic item, GM can deny if desired. - A cleric could craft a flute of summon natures ally way above his level. And again, he needs the money, time and GM approval.
Surprisingly, most of these problems cease to exist if we stop pretending low level characters have unlimited time and money to craft things, and remember that custom magic items require GM approval to create.
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