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QuidEst wrote:

Huh, that's funny to see. *quietly updates my false villain kitsune necromancer and false hero tanuki disaster scam couple to have the tanuki be a Slayer instead of a Swashbuckler*

Now hold on, forget the rest of this thread, I wanna talk about a Kitsune Necromancer and Tanuki Slayer power couple immediately.

It's an idea I had during the Necromancer playtest. The class is very good at making lots of easily-dispatched creatures that look more impressive than they really are, at least for a little bit. That means that you can play an excellent heel, making somebody look really good.

Kitsune Necromancer, pick up Alchemist multiclass to take mutagens in order to boost deception and performance. He shows up in disguises to a small village, makes sure there's no actual hero already there, and starts terrorizing the local populace. (I'm thinking a bit of a laid back theater vibe outside of the role.) Shortly after, a dashing heroic human swordsman shows up, hot on the heels of a vile necromancer. In reality, it's the kitsune's tanuki boyfriend in disguise. (I'm thinking much more ego-driven and aggressive outside of the role.) Stage a dramatic confrontation with the necromancer, really selling how "difficult" the zombies are to fight through, and eventually defeat the foul necromancer.

The hero basks in the rewards and adoration of the people for a few days before an urgent runner from another village shows up asking for the famous and well-regarded undead-slaying hero. He "reluctantly" accepts any aid that the village can provide him to end this menace, and the two head off to enjoy some time together between cons.

The tanuki is the one who really gets a thrill out of it, while the kitsune is along for the ride and learned just enough necromancy to make thralls.

Swashbuckler had much more of a personable "face" aspect to the hero role, but Slayer can do some impressive action economy without buffs, and the Consecrated Panoply or spirit damage Blood-Seeking Blade can both do a better job of passing for a holy warrior.

What limits are intended on the Quicken provided by Reckless Abandon?

Usually, Quicken states what actions are allowed, but this is undefined so technically allows any action.

Both martial classes getting "cast two spells every round" as a capstone is very funny to me.

Hang on. Haaang on. What do we really want on Daredevil, at least in terms of offense? We want the strongest agile attack we can get to stack MAP reduction, and we want good athletics for our maneuvers.

Bestial Mutagen is incredible for this. We get +1 above curve athletics item bonus, +1 above curve attack bonus, agile claws that beat weapon damage at level 11, and we're only paying with our reflex, acrobatics, and stealth?

Going with Kholo, we can sacrifice our wisdom score to have +4 Str, +3 Dex, +2 Int, +1 Con, +0 Cha, -1 Wis at the start of a free archetype game so that we can multiclass archetype into Alchemist. In a regular game, level 6 was pretty dead anyway, so we can wait to boost Int a second time until 5th, and we'll delay Scrambling Roll until 10th.

Once we hit 11th level, we're golden. We're getting our extra damage die a level or two before everyone else, we have near-Fighter accuracy or better on maneuvers, and we fall apart like a wet paper bag the minute any of our saves is targeted. That last one isn't good, but it's certainly thematic.

Stacking that up with the circumstance bonus to trip from Great Kholo, we're doing pretty well. I know that we are passing up Wrestler with this, but dang.

Huh, that's funny to see. *quietly updates my false villain kitsune necromancer and false hero tanuki disaster scam couple to have the tanuki be a Slayer instead of a Swashbuckler*

I hadn't even thought of allies going down. It's certainly dramatic to have the Slayer burst into action when an ally falls unconscious, but I can see them switching it to enemies-only as an easy fix. But hey, we've got a full year where we'll have the Necromancer out and this version of the ability. (Thralls including a "don't trigger abilities on reaching 0 or being destroyed" would be even better proofing, and prevent enemy reactions from causing issues.)

Remember that feats with both the Risky and Press traits grant you the adrenaline first, before any part of the action happens, so you can absolutely use one and still get adrenaline's MAP reduction.

Meanwhile, I'm poking around with a halfling right now - because stunt damage triggers any time you force a creature into a prop (while having adrenaline), if you can get access to critical specialisations, that's even more potential stunt damage. And hey, the Frying Pan is in the club group! How about a former line cook who's lost all fear of death?

Yep. The risky-press options seem like they're mostly maneuvers, so I guess it's a way to get double-agile on them. Ah, I think that's what I was missing from them- I forgot the free built-in agile on athletics checks! With Athletics/Acrobatics being +2 ahead of a strike and double-agile, you're only at -1 vs. a no-MAP strike. I would probably want the risky press grapple, since that's the maneuver that feels best to end your turn on. I'd probably use it on turns when I didn't have to move up.

I had crit spec club in the back of my mind, but yeah, you do need an ancestry crit-spec for it. Frying pan is one-handed and at least crits like a martial weapon. Accompanying Strike and Hit or Miss seem relevant, as well as Wrestler archetype Combat Grab.

One thing I missed was the flexibility features. The first one is useless, since I'm permanently locked into Breakaway Attack. The second one is a bonus risky feat 14th or lower. I'd probably pick up Hit of Miss because the 14th level ones don't feel useful, 12th doesn't have any, that's the only one at 10th, 8th only has the terrible Escape Shuffle, and if I go any lower I'll feel sad.

It seems like the capstone flexibility features has a typo? It changes from risky to press for the requirements. If it's meant to expandd options,bit should probably be risky or press, so that locking in a bonus feat by using it as a pre-req doesn't lock you out of getting the capstone.

Thanks for stopping by; I appreciate the insight! I can see a few more approaches I might enjoy after that.

I couldn't let Slayer get all the fun! Let's go ahead and see what we can do with Daredevil.

As before, I don't really have a lot of existing characters that fit this in particular. I'd like to do a Great Kholo with a bite focus, and maybe something agile. Seeing if Clawdancer can fit in might be interesting, but archetyping should probably get saved for last.

Let's just go ahead and get started with Great Kholo. We'll be athletics/strength, which means we need to have dexterity secondary and probably tertiary constitution. We'll gently sprinkle in one mental stat as the other tertiary. Crunch is our only relevant kholo feat.

1st: First off, we need a risky feat. We will also want a press action so that we can benefit from adrenaline.
- Breakaway Attack: We've got a d8 bite already- this gives us a risky flourish "unarmed" d8 with deadly d8. Good to have a stronger bludgeoning option too. Strong contender, and it covers our ranged option.
- Flying Hurdle Stunt: Risky press, so we can't start with it, and size-restricted. Swap places with an enemy. Get a +1 on a crit. Uh... What's the point of this? Like, even if you succeed, you are just in each other's spot. I guess you can use it as a dramatically worse Tumble Through using Athletics?
- Forceful Kickoff Stunt: Risky press, so we can't start with it, and size-restricted. Acrobatics-based Shove that lets you Leap. Slightly better crit-shove distance. This doesn't seem like a "move away from them" character, and we're focused on Athletics.
- Rebounding Fall Stunt: Risky press, so we can't start with it, and size-restricted. Acrobatics trip with mildly better crit damage, and prone yourself on failure. Again, we have +1 to actually trip with Athletics.
- Wheeling Pull Stunt: Risky press, so we can't start with it, and size-restricted. Athletics to grapple and move both of you, and a very minor crit failure effect. Grapple isn't something we get a +1 to, so that's fine. It also resolves against reflex instead of fortitude.

From those, it's reasonable to consider Breakaway Attack for if we just want to beat somebody up and still get risky perks. Wheeling Attack gives us a press that we can use- move up and trip, followed by grapple with reduced MAP against reflex? Unfortunately, off-guard doesn't apply to that but it does apply to AC. Lets go with Breakaway Attack.

That means our Press for accuracy is Pressing Pummel. Move, trip, attack at effective -2. It'd be nice to get Scrambling Retreat for better AC, but we'll keep it in mind later.

2nd: Why roll to hit when Caroming Charge gives us multi-target auto-damage? Heck, we can use Breakaway Attack to get our regular attack and then nyoom for guaranteed follow-up damage against anything without a reaction.

4th: Bouncing Hurl is interesting, giving us a two-target Bouncing Hurl for ranged. Can't do this with Caroming Charge, though, so let's see what else there is. Daring Reversal isn't bad, but it's press, and your first action can almost get you out of flanking without issue. Exhilarating Athlete gives us a slow climb with adrenaline and better leaping, but I don't really think that'll come up much. High-Flying Tumble is Athletics leap-tumble, but we have Caroming Charge to get through somebody's space. Wall Slam needs two props. I guess this is probably a good level to pick up Scrambling Retreat.

6th: Double Breakaway is an extra action for one die of damage and a weak crit effect. Headsmash gives us a grapple follow-up to try and stun lower-level enemies. Rushing Stride gives us move-and-strike as a risky action, but we've off-guard against everyone else. Mainly for a boss...? Weapon Twist Stunt is acrobatics. Nothing I really want, but Rushing Stride or Bouncing Hurl can sit around for when it's the right circumstance.

8th: We can't use Accompanying Strike because it's weapon-based. Escape Shuffle is just... when do you need this? Heightened Awareness is a "twice in a campaign" feat, and again, we have Caroming Charge to get some damage in against enemies we can't target well. Scrambling Roll, though, is giving us +2 on reflex saves as a reaction- not a bad deal. We will go with that.

10th: Deadly Advantage seems like something we needed to build towards earlier. Wait... nope. You have no way to use this in-class, and need somebody else to apply the conditions. (Trip Up is a two-action press with a condition that doesn't last through next turn.) Deadly Advantage should probably be reworked or removed. Hit or Miss is a fun one to pull out in emergencies- especially if you still have a hero point. We'll go with that, since I don't think we're going to be spending actions on one-round temp HP.

12th: Fortify Self is one round an hour? Pass. Knee to the Nethers... doesn't need to specify not needing a free hand, that's normal for unarmed attacks? Great feat, though- getting grapple with a conditional attack in the same action with delayed MAP increase is a very solid Press option. Next is multi-trip, so Knee to the Nethers it is.

14th: Freewheeling Strike is a lot of actions for something so conditional. Opportunistic Press Stunt is your standard press/risky/size-restricted. Stride, reposition, and if an ally is there, they can strike. Shattering Breakaway is a two-action Breakaway to smash a bottle and do bleed with Enfeeble. Weird that only now does something work with Deadly Advantage. Well, this one seems worth it for the debuff, so let's grab it.

16th: We do not have the crit-spec or damage to justify gambling so hard on a crit with Risky Overextension. Deadly Rush isn't for something we're using much. Storm of Debris it is.

18th: Lucky Spark is near-permanent roll twice with +2 on saves. Sounds like this takes the place of any legendary saves, so we kind of have to take it.

20th: Double Scrambling Retreat is funny. But Reckless Abandon gives us no restriction Quickened. That means we can Shattering Breakaway into Caroming Charge every round after the first. That's the strongest capstone feat I've seen. The third one is great, but obviously can't compare.

---

Verdict: It feels weird that we went in with the intent to do maneuvers and bite, and we ended up chucking junk at people and bumping into them instead. We fall back on maneuvers and bite whenever we deal with reactive strike. Letting unarmed strikes work better with the class would be nice- make Accompanying Strike support unarmed strikes as well.

What's up with Deadly Advantage, though? You can't get bonus damage from it for another four levels without outside help.

As somebody who doesn't see much use in reposition and shove, I'm glad the class still has enough stuff for me to do. I really like Caroming Charge giving early guaranteed damage, although I'll admit it might be more appropriate at sixth level.

That said, that's that. I think any other Daredevil I built would pick almost the exact same feats, with very little consideration for the others. I'm not all that interested in maneuvers, and Daring Stunt with Audacious Combatant is what it takes to get me to engage with them, but I'm not going to be following up my maneuver with another maneuver if I can help it. Thus, this is a one-character thread for my one Daredevil build.

I think RAI probably not, but I honestly think it should. I don't know if Paizo made it like this for the playtest, but I feel the class relies too heavily on shove as a mechanic when I feel it should encompass all Athletics maneuvers.

I think shove is normally not useful (especially compared to grapple or trip), so it's being made into a minor damage maneuver so that they're all on more equal footing.

All right, let's go for a Warded Mail start instead! Warded Mail is interesting because instead of wanting energy damage to trigger weaknesses, we want piercing or slashing to resist common physical damage. We'll get a little slashing resistance from full plate at 7th, so we'll focus on getting higher piercing resistance from the trophy. Just a quick check- do we get more resistance than a Barbarian? Well, we get it eight levels earlier, and it scales to 11 instead of 7-ish, at the cost of being lower on the secondary. We also get +1 AC from heavy armor. (Obviously, Guardian covers this much better, getting all physical resistances, so we will have to see how well we do on other cool abilities.) Good enough for me!

We're building out a sturdy brute with this, so we'll go with Kholo. Normally, I grab the big bite attack for this sort of thing, but Slayer doesn't want you using unarmed strikes. We'll go with Kholo Weapon Familiarity to get access to the Spirit Thresher and its crit spec.

... Wait, hang on. Even if we get weapon proficiency from our ancestry, we can't make it our bloodseeking blade later without burning a first-level feat that gives us proficiency anyway? Well, let's see if we care about our first-level feat or not. We can always just switch to something martial at 11th or drop the sweep trait that makes up the advanced budget difference.

1st: Spiked Surcoat is just fun. I like the unfairness of dealing plink damage back to enemies. We'll use our starting trophy to add a little spirit damage, in keeping with our spirit thresher theme.

2nd: Personalized Gear is tempting for five feet of movement. Comfort trait is only useful until 7th, but it is style points.

4th: Nothing here is as good as picking up Sudden Pounce to get Off-Guard on closing attacks, but Blood for Blood would be thematic.

6th: Let's see... Relentless Counterstrike is a 10% chance for each attack when we use Armored Shelter to refund us the action. Wall of Will is weird- my quarry probably doesn't want to pick a fight with me anyway, because I've got broad physical resistance against it. Let's go with Relentless Counterstrike, since that's increasing the value of something I'm already doing.

8th: Don't need Armored Fortress- I don't even know what I'm supposed to do while not attacking or moving. Pick up buff spells to cast, I guess? Once again, 8th level feels dead. Go back to first or second level and pick up something we passed up- Instant Enmity, probably.

10th: Share Insight lets me buff allies for a quarry fight with a flat resistance 5 to everything? That sounds nice.

11th: Bloodseeking Blade, obviously. We need an offensive boost to justify being Slayer instead of Guardian. 8th level feat is so dead, we can take a first level feat just to keep the flavor of Spirit Thresher.

12th: Double Quarry tax, obviously. Give up on the Spirit Thresher, reflavor a longsword, keep Instant enmity at 8th, and pick up Endless Enmity. Our allies now have resistance 5 against one enemy every ten minutes.

14th: Bloodburst Phial, even more obviously. Open Wound feels like it needs that bleed support to come earlier- the only place it shows up is 12th, competing with "being able to have more than a single quarry".

16th: Man, these upgrades just feel lackluster. "Get +2 to non-reflex area saves when spending an action" is... well, it's not bad, but it feels like that should be level 8. I want to be able to use it against a haunt and an AoE Fear, get a little mileage out of it. At level 16, it feels like I've just spent a whole lot of levels missing it. I'm just grabbing Open Wound so Bloodburst Phial also makes enemies off-guard.

18th: Obliterate feels better with a d12 weapon.

20th: Spend my reaction to get... let's see, use a reaction for +2 AC and reflex every round? I would be less impressed if it didn't work with a d12 weapon. I guess that gives us Guardian AC. Make a one-action strike with +2 to hit? That's Fighter accuracy. Actually, I kinda like that. We've can flexibly pick which we want, and we still have the actions to do both if we want. Shame that it locks out Haste, though. Oh, we do get to go retrain Relentless Counterstrike while we're at it.

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Verdict: Bloodseeker Blade's 3d6 damage and Bloodburst Phial are the only significant things that we have over just playing a two-handed Guardian who never uses their taunt. That's pretty significant, though. Oh, and better/earlier weapon specialization! I forgot about that part; that moves the damage difference up from 11th to 7th. Guardian doesn't pull ahead on armor proficiency until 9th level, so that doesn't leave any point where we're left wondering why we're playing Slayer instead.

We mainly care about quarry because we can grant the party resistance 5.

Actually, hang on. We don't care about trophies at all after first level. We hunt one thing with piercing damage for resistance, and one damage type for our blade sometime before 11th level. If we want to get a painbow spread for advanced-prep weaknesses, sure, but magical painbow runes area already going to cover that.

In that case... we only really care about quarry for combat effects (mainly ally resistance), so we want both enmity feats instead of double quarry.

Overall, I think this feels better than Old Tom Bones. I might play this, and I think the fun would really start to show once get to start seeing the little unfair damage differences stacking up.

I missed that the spells have the Relentless trait, which maybe explains the lack of higher rank spells, and why the capstone costs your reaction every turn instead of giving perma-haste. Since I'm building mostly around out of combat utility and the low DCs rather than trying to make combat spells work, I guess it's not very exciting to me, and I'd enjoy actually getting 7th and 8th rank slots as normal. I do get that it's the more boring outcome, though.

BlueTuesday33 wrote:

I want Trophies to offer access to specific abilities, blue mage style.

BlueTuesday33 wrote:

Like what Dr.Aspects suggests, I wanna use my Trophies to cast Monster abilities. I want to get specific.

We get teased with this concept with the Chymist’s Vials letting you steal "one special vision ability the creature the trophy was claimed from had".

And I kind of wish they went more in with that. Let all the Sig tools copy a specific type of ability from a defeated enemy.

I don't know what types of abilities you can safely allow copying.

Vision is a good one, so long as it's reasonably clear that it doesn't include gaze attacks. You do have a good stretch of levels where Slayer potentially demolishes any shapeshifters or illusionist plot if they hunt a mid-level outer planes creature, but that's at least a niche pairing. At best, you could extend it to other senses.

Movement speed needs to be limited until permanent flight is available, and it's probably giving too good of a burrow speed for PCs. I guess you can have a list of how much movement you get for each speed, and levels they work?

Resistance is already covered, and more generally accessible. Immunties are very high-level only, as we've seen from Kineticist.

Special attacks are obviously off the table, as are general "abilities". Giant boss attacks, Cyclops auto-success on anything, Bone Croupier once-a-minute fortune/misfortune...

I guess there are common unarmed strikes? You could have a standard set of claw, jaw, horn, slam, hoof, wing, etc. with standardized die sizes that you can get if the creature had one. Something akin to Bestial Mutagen with more normal damage dice and no drawbacks.

I don't really want the innate spell feats converted to require killing a caster/magical creature with the spells you want.

I guess I'm just not seeing a whole lot of situations where you could give the freedom of "get this category of thing from a monster" that wouldn't quickly be a top five cheese strat, require GM permission, or need to be "check against a predetermined list or formula for PC-balanced versions". Maybe I'm overlooking something, though.

Or maybe I'm overthinking it, and it's "gimme a giant list of ten-to-twenty options from the standard Monster Core glossary abilities, and let me have one of them once I meet a level pre-req".

QuidEst wrote:

Man, Arm Bloodburst Vial is pretty wild, even for a once-a-day.

And it isn't even once-a-day, it's once per 10 minutes. If you have time to pause between fights you can basically open every encounter with that thing.

Whoops, conflated that with something else while bouncing back and forth. Nice to be able to get a couple uses out of it in a day!

This is great to hear! The rough preview clarification makes it a lot more clear how Thaumaturge's weaknesses work, and how being prepared with the real weakness is still advantageous for them (being able to stack that with a personal antithesis).

Old Tom Bones, Perceptive Catfolk Slayer. We want to play a wily old catfolk who has as many types of vision at his disposal as possible thanks to a collection of monster eyes.

For Catfolk stuff, Nine Lives Catfolk makes a lot of sense for our old catfolk who's lived through it all. Cat Nap gives us benefits for dozing off, and we might want Catfolk Dance to give us a better shot at that fire-breathing doing something if we decide to go Dex-based. Otherwise, Cat's Luck is always good.

Stats: We want an accuracy stat, plus Wisdom secondary to max out our Perception.

For Slayer, obviously we're going with Chymist's Vials. Here's where we take a break to try and figure out what has vision worth collecting.
- Darkvision (this one is such a gimme I'd like it to be included as a default so that the effect does something by default)
- Greater Darkvision
- All-Around Vision
- Heaven's View/Cloudsight/Fog Vision/Mist Vision (there are a lot of different ones for this)
- ... Constant Truesight/True Seeing?
- Magnetic Vision (Asp of Grief, a very specific one- see armor through walls?)
- Smoke Vision
- Infrared Vision (one AP creature only)
- Sandstorm Sight
- Blizzard Sight/Snow Vision
- ... Constant See the Unseen/See Invisibility?
- Painsight
- Status Sight
- Blindsight (one of the most powerful ones available- is this even vision? Is "blindsight" even an ability the game has anymore? It's not defined anywhere in 2e. If you miss the uncommon Graul by the end of 4th level, your next opportunity is a rare 16th-level creature.)
- Sporesight (one rare creature only)
- Greensight

Funny Mentions:
- Curse Sense- see (and normally hear, but that's not vision-based) through any silver you have cursed within one mile.
- Gem Sight- gives you True Seeing! ... but you have to be holding a gem to see at all. Still might be worth it for a while.

Okay, let's see...
- Greater Darkvision feels worth snagging, with over a hundred options for it.
- "See through various conditions" is pretty common. Of those, fog/mist and smoke are the only ones that the PCs are likely to generate themselves. For the former, Air Scamp is the easiest, only something that can be dignified at first level- after that, you need a rare 4th level, or a Young Cloud Dragon at 9th for something common. Smoke Vision is much more forgiving to get.
- All-Around Vision is probably the most regularly useful options, and fits the theme of the character well. It's more than eighty options to choose from, so not too bad.
- Permanent Truesight/True Seeing starts coming online around 8th or 9th level for monsters, with a handful of options even that early. It's generally "stuck" at sixth rank, but considering that's the floor, hunting and killing one of these monsters early is a huge leg up for quite a while. That's enough to make the character really stand out, shredding through illusions and shapeshifting for five or six levels.
- Possibly grab something weird. Magnetic Vision is sufficiently trippy, but you need to be a real jerk to hunt down an Asp of Grief.

---

Level 1: Well, Drink Adaptation Serums doesn't really fit most games. Bloodscent is nice for picking up another weird sense, but we'd be going off of tertiary Intelligence to use it. We need a hand free for the vials (well, let's probably go with a two-hand trait weapon), so shields are no good. Saved by Sudden Pounce- this is perfect! Looks like we're investing in Athletics.

Level 2: ... Pack Slayer to scoop up those Air Scamps if we missed them at first is tempting. We care a lot about specific monsters, after all. But since we're already investing in Wisdom and playing somebody called "Old Tom Bones", I think we need to go with Slayer's Tricks for some occult cantrips. What cantrips? Well, we're already breathing fire, so Eat Fire isn't bad- we can look into grabbing Smoke Vision to bypass the drawback to ourselves. ... Should we get a backup ranged attack using our second cantrip? Yes. Am I getting Detect Metal instead because killing an Asp of Grief would feel terrible? Also yes.

Level 4: Condition removal isn't really in keeping with our vision theme, and a minute to remove a condition makes Cure-All unlikely to ever be worth a feat. Probably go with Blood for Blood to make Old Tom Bones sturdier. Well... not that much sturdier, since temporary hitpoints are only half level, but at least it's rolled in with an attack? I don't know that we're hunting quarry enough for Blood Rush, and Apply Spirit Oil is only once a day to spend an action getting something that only does something on a crit.

Level 6: Spell Slates, naturally! We'll have to go look at the occult list.

Level 8: Catalyzing Flask is a big disappointment here. Witch gets a scaling number, and they're potions instead of elixirs. A feat normally gets you four free elixirs. What the heck is going on with getting one elixir for a feat- and then making you pay for it once, so it practically needs to be below your level instead of on-level? Alternatives are quarry-exclusive when-crit reaction, a shield feat we can't use, and a crafting feat. Field-Forged Tools it is, but it feels like a dead level.

Level 10: Share Insight. Precise-sense quarry-detection is hard to argue with, with a possible vision upgrade.

Level 11: Blood-Seeking Blade, probably. Extra damage and two-action accuracy strike.

Level 12: Double Quarry is really nice, and we also want Expanded Spell Slates. We seem to be missing the final spell slates feat to get 7th and 8th rank spells, though? I would take Spectral Lenses, but... Expanded Spell Slates gives me eight hours of See the Unseen, a higher level slot from Spell Slates, and more spells later. It feels like Spectral Lenses should be 10th level.

Level 14: ... Man, Arm Bloodburst Vial is pretty wild, even for a once-a-day. However, I need Double Quarry so I can actually run into a quarry more regularly.

Level 16: Maaan, 30ft. cone is a level 16 feat? Level 16? And it's just a range increase? No increase to d6s, no "you can make allies immune to it", nothin'? Arm Bloodburts Vial it is.

Level 18: Terrifying Bloodlust, I guess? Maybe three-action max-damage strike is better than I'm realizing.

Level 20: These capstones are bad. Quickened as a reaction instead of the usual permanent quickened, or... what, the ability to get quickened on casting only when a creature dies? I guess we'll go with Eternal Hunt and get rid of our Eat Fire cantrip in order to get our fire-breathing or accuracy-stab down to one action and one reaction.

Verdict:
Picking a vision upgrade to hunt down and kill for is... interesting. There are some unique options. The only other personal upgrade to vision seems over-costed at level 12. Also, Old Tom Bones invested in spells, but the usual chain ends earlier than the caster archetypes for some reason, on top of only ever getting expert proficiency. The only Chymist's Vials feat to feel any good was Share Insight.

Having something be once a day is okay if you get value from it, but a once-a-day ability that only does something if you get a crit within a certain window...? Eh. Similarly, quarry-only feats seem like you're going to be missing out on them a lot of the time, and making it further restricted to something like "crit by your quarry" doesn't help.

All in all, neat, but I don't think I would actually play this character, or any other with the vials.

QuidEst wrote:

TheTownsend wrote:

Maya Coleman wrote:

We look forward to seeing what everyone puts together!

Crunchier than I usually go, but when I saw Daredevil gets Diehard at level one I initially thought "Well it's redundant with a Grimspawn Nephilim then," but actually you can just swap it like usual for anythign that doubles a feature, so now you've got a free general feat at level one, on any base ancestry! Normally reserved for humans! Gives Death Defying a new meaning!

Huh? Where are you getting that rule from? Many feats do that for skill training, but there's a reason they have to spell it out every time.

Dang, is that not official? I thought that was at least implied with an "as usual" in a few places. Kind of a knock on a whole Lineage if multiple classes get the benefits baseline.

"As usual for backgrounds, if you would gain the trained proficiency rank for one of these skill from your class at 1st level, you instead become trained in another skill of your choice." - Free Heart feat for elves

It's very specifically background trained skills, not bonus feats.

It's that time again! The part of the playtest you all know and love: the part where Quid builds some characters!

This isn't a case where I've got a specific existing character concept that could be represented by the new class- I don't usually play "monster slayers", and all my serial killer types are over in Starfinder.

Looking through the signature tools for some inspiration...
- I love getting some physical resistance, so Warded Mail being able to give scaling slashing or piercing resistance is really cool. You need to go hunt something to get that, since starting trophies won't do.
- Chymist's Vials are... underwhelming, but getting special vision does remind me of one of a character concept I had lying around, Old Tom Bones, an old catfolk Eyebiter Mesmerist who would have his eye go around independently. Using Slayer, I can make a one-eyed catfolk that pops different monster eyes into his empty socket for different vision effects. That one definitely requires hunting some specific creatures, because the reinforcement doesn't do anything with a default trophy. Why can they breathe fire? ... Don't worry about it.
- A friend of mine had an idea, but that build will be once they're free to work on it.

Well, let's go ahead and start with the new Old Tom Bones, and see where we get!

Maya Coleman wrote:

We look forward to seeing what everyone puts together!

Crunchier than I usually go, but when I saw Daredevil gets Diehard at level one I initially thought "Well it's redundant with a Grimspawn Nephilim then," but actually you can just swap it like usual for anythign that doubles a feature, so now you've got a free general feat at level one, on any base ancestry! Normally reserved for humans! Gives Death Defying a new meaning!

Huh? Where are you getting that rule from? Many feats do that for skill training, but there's a reason they have to spell it out every time.

Ah, yes, I forgot about crits reducing stages by 2 instead of 1. I was purely thinking of it as needing a crit to succeed at all.

Also initially I was a just think there were 5 position (stage 0 through stage 5) that you had to get through, which is true, but it's only 4 "intervals" so I was creating an off by 1 error, lol.

2 crit successes is incredibly likely to happen with enough time. That is a 1 in 400 chance. So after 400 rolls your chance to have it happen is very close to 100%. And 400 rolls is only 40 minutes.

Wellll... I definitely cut some corners incorrectly before, and I do want to take the time to figure out the correct answer. Probability gets messy, and it's good to refresh myself on it occasionally.

If you expect an event to happen 1 in 400 times, you expect it to take 400 tries, but the probability that it happens in 400 tries is actually about 64%. The expected value isn't where you get nearly a 100% of something having happened- it's just the likeliest number of tries something will take.

The probability of rolling two d20s and getting two 20s is 1 in 400, but that requires rolling two dice, not one. However, we aren't rolling two dice 400 times independently, we're rolling over and over until two sequential rolls both give us 20.

Doing a bit of math that I had to look up, it looks like you actually expect it to take 420 rolls to get two consecutive twenties. So, 42 minutes in-game.

Fortunately, just treating it as rolling two dice until a pair of twenties gives a result pretty similar to rolling one die sequentially until two twenties were rolled in sequence.

says who?

If I'm GMing a table and a player can tell me how they came by those trophies I would let them have specific trophies.

I'll certainly do the same and ask the GM to, but better starting trophy rules by default would be nice.

"You gain a catalyzing flask as a secondary tool, a special alchemical vial that contains a level 0 common alchemical elixir of your choice."

the issue is that there ARE no "level 0 common alchemical elixir", or any level 0 elixir at all. This means that this 8th level feat is a dead one.

It starts with a level 1 elixir, and you have to buy an upgrade, of your level or lower. So never a dead feat, but definitely surprisingly weak compared to Witch's scaling number of free potions on a lower feat and Alchemist archetype's four free alchemical items.

Definitely intended to include giants, given they're listed as viable trophy options. Good catch, John.

All (higher-level) humanoids are viable trophy options; you just don't have monster knowledge about them.

One BIG issue is that the previous Slayer class was renamed the Avenger, and is now an archetype.

The Slayer was a pseudo-assassin in P1E and now it's a monster hunter in P2E... but it' snot the SAME Hunter class as P1E...

That sounds more like a little issue.

Avenger covers the old iconic Slayer- a religious individual carrying out violence on behalf of their faith, through single-target precision damage.

That leaves "Slayer" open. Are folks going to be confused? Probably not? I only ever thought about Slayer's Ankou's Shadow archetype. It wasn't a very memorable class, and Ranger picked up the action-to-target-for-precision bit years ago.

The Daredevil is a fragile martial. It's only 8HP and it only accesses Light Armor. Going with a STR Daredevil is going to place you as durable as a Cloistered Cleric with Mystic Armor (AC-wise) from lvl. 1-4.

Your math is off on this one, I think? Mystic Armor gives +1 AC, and light armor gives +2. So you'll have +1 better AC than any cloth-caster who's got the same secondary Dex, even after they self-buff.

Chymist's Eye from Chymist's Vials has the following reinforce ability:

"Reinforced You also gain one special vision ability the creature the trophy was claimed from had, such as darkvision or a cloud giant’s cloudsight, for the duration."

All of the other starting reinforce options give you something you can use right away, but this one relies on an uncommon characteristic. It's not too hard to hunt a darkvision creature at low levels, but if you start at high levels, you're really missing out, and you can't even go pick up something you "missed".

Don't get me wrong, I'd love to keep the cool, unique vision upgrade trick! But maybe at least include darkvision as a starting default? That doesn't solve the high-level issue, but starting out without it makes Chymist's Vials stand out as a really rough start. When you're not dealing with your quarry, the only thing you get is a 1/minute weaker Breathe Fire.

shroudb wrote:

Ravingdork wrote:

So if my character is 10 feet away from an active dispelling globe and casts lightning bolt directly through the middle of it, does any lightning come out of the back of the globe? Why or why not?

Yes. There's nothing physical blocking LoE.

Globe straight up says that only the part of the area that's inside the globe is surpressed. So the line after the globe continues normally.

Sounds clear cut for area effects. What about non-area effects, such as a ray or other magical projectile?

Also clear-cut. If the target isn't in the globe, you can target them normally without interference, even if they're on the other side.

QuidEst wrote:

Needing to clear four stages takes, at worst, two nat 20s in a row. At one roll per round, the expected length of time is 400 rounds, or 40 minutes.

How do you suppose it only takes 2 nat 20s at worst?

I suppose the "bounded accuracy" of the system is the answer. You shouldn't end up with a situation where the difference between the players fort save and the DC is 20.

To an above poster's point (and I didn't verify before writing this):
Trained equal 2 + level proficiency - The characters are level 3 so +5.

Drained 4 with a -1 con would be a -4 penalty applied to the roll with a -1 con modifier (net -5) for a total net of 0.

Meaning a roll of 17 or better is what is required as a worst case. And if you have a better con (and as drained condition reduces) your odds increase.

Again I don't have the right knowledge of probability and statistics to do the math, but it does seem more reasonable with that to just say after a night of rest the curse is gone.

Exactly. Even at level 1 with a Con penalty and the full drained 4, a nat 20 will still crit-succeed against against DC 17, and that's the worst-case scenario. Tracking moving up and down the track is a pain for the statistics, so I just took the simplified worst case and figured that out. That worst-case scenario is about 40 minutes to clear, and pretty much any PC is going to have better odds than that, so even overnight rest is being a little harsh.

Needing to clear four stages takes, at worst, two nat 20s in a row. At one roll per round, the expected length of time is 400 rounds, or 40 minutes.

Stages

Source Player Core pg. 430 2.0
An affliction typically has multiple stages, each of which lists an effect followed by an interval in parentheses. When you reach a given stage of an affliction, you are subjected to the effects listed for that stage.

At the end of a stage's listed interval, you must attempt a new saving throw. On a success, you reduce the stage by 1; on a critical success, you reduce the stage by 2. You are then subjected to the effects of the new stage. If the affliction's stage is ever reduced below stage 1, the affliction ends and you don't need to attempt further saves unless you're exposed to the affliction again.

On a failure, the stage increases by 1; on a critical failure, the stage increases by 2. You are then subjected to the effects listed for the new stage. If a failure or critical failure would increase the stage beyond the highest listed stage, the affliction instead repeats the effects of the highest stage.

I think the thing you're missing is the affliction stage rules. Even with a terrible save modifier, any PC will eventually burn through the very short interval affliction of Corrupting Spite. Even if they need two natural twenties in a row, that would still be under an hour. All that's left is removing the drained condition, which happens (painfully slowly) with rest, or because the curse is gone, can be done with lower level spells.

So, this isn't actually a case where the designers forgot something. It's just that the "wait it out" part of removing afflictions covers both "eventually making enough consecutive successful saves" and "waiting out a listed duration".

I'd argue that to magic, anti-magic very much counts as a solid wall.

For Dispelling Globe, there is no restriction on the anti-magic that would allow some sort of pass-through.

Dispelling Globe wrote:

You create an immobile globe around yourself. It attempts to counteract any spell from outside the globe whose area or targets enter into it, as if the globe were a dispel magic spell 1 rank lower than its actual spell rank. If the counteract attempt succeeds, it prevents only the portion of the spell that would have entered the globe (so if the spell also has targets outside the globe, or part of its area is beyond the globe, those targets or that area are affected normally). You must form the sphere in an unbroken open space, so its edges don't pass through any creatures or objects, or the spell is lost (though creatures can enter the globe after the spell is cast).

There is no text indicating any sort of mechanic where a line AoE is allowed to resume after hitting the globe. The globe is not a ghostly blind spot, it's a static sphere of counteracting anti-magic. As such, I'd rule that the globe ends a line AoE as if it were a solid wall.

By default, bursts start from an origin point and have to travel outward; bursts explicitly need LoE from the exact target point to then expand radially. Without that rule, fireball explosions would ghost through walls unimpeded.

So if you detonate a burst fireball right in front of the globe, you'll get a big shadow as the globe blocks the AoE.
Not a 'ring of fire.'

And no, you cannot detonate a fireball inside the globe, as that portion being dispelled is all of it.

Because we know that you cannot curve the LoE around the obstruction, I'd argue that no, you cannot cast/detonate a fireball behind the globe without beating the anti-magic's counteract.

To make the fireball detonate behind the globe, that magic would travel along the LoE, in and then out of the globe, still triggering the counteract.

"so if (...) part of its area is beyond the globe, (...) that area (is) affected normally"

So the part of the lightning bolt or fireball is beyond the globe affects that area as normal, i.e. does damage. It even uses the word "beyond", so I don't think you interpret that to only mean the close side.

I don't think "the portion of the spell that entered the globe" is meant to be taken as a magical spell-packet moving through the air; I think that's language covering both area and multi-target.

You keep mentioning antimagic, but I don't think it's actually antimagic? That would be Antimagic Field, and even that allows having spells move across it.

I never far enough into Kingmaker to really hit those problems, so I'm probably underestimating it. I guess I'm used to hexploration usually including things like local bounty boards and side-quests that support something like Slayer even with plenty of random encounters.

yellowpete wrote:

I'd argue that in order to put a spell behind it would invoke the same counteract as attempting to put a spell inside it.

Again, unless you allow spell curving for everything, the line of magic of the spell cast is otherwise to need to cross the threshold and enter the globe.

"You create an immobile globe around yourself. It attempts to counteract any spell from outside the globe whose area or targets enter into it, as if the globe were a dispel magic spell 1 rank lower than its actual spell rank. If the counteract attempt succeeds, it prevents only the portion of the spell that would have entered the globe (so if the spell also has targets outside the globe, or part of its area is beyond the globe, those targets or that area are affected normally). You must form the sphere in an unbroken open space, so its edges don't pass through any creatures or objects, or the spell is lost (though creatures can enter the globe after the spell is cast)."

The globe only counteracts any spell whose area or targets enters the sphere, and it only counteracts the portion of the area or the targets who are within the sphere. So if you cast a Fireball on the other other side, it only counteracts the area that overlaps with the globe. If the fireball is cast on the far side and doesn't overlap, there's nothing to counteract.

You can even place the center of a fireball within the sphere, and hope for the counteract to turn it into a ring of fire damage instead.

Obviously we'll have to see the core playtest, but I also sort of worry about the core gimmick of 10 minutes to pick a primary quarry and requiring that prey to be your level or higher. I feel like that could lead to some serious problems in certain campaigns, depending on how impactful the quarry mechanic is.

In particular, I've come off a couple of APs that rely heavily on both random encounters (so no prep time) and groups of weak enemies (so no quarry even with). How is the slayer going to feel in an AP book only has like... 3 enemies in the whole book that reasonably work as quarries?

... There's also adventures like Abomination Vaults that have a decent number of high level enemies but don't always telegraph them. Is open a door, see a boss, then run away so the Slayer can activate their gimmick going to be an expected gameplay loop?

Mostly just speculation to kill time but I can't help but think of the way the Investigator outright doesn't function in certain campaigns in a way no other class really does if the adventure doesn't support their gimmick.

From the video, I got the impression this was all at least reasonably well addressed.

- Lower level hordes give the Slayer lots of bonus actions, unless we were missing some kind of timing restriction on their reaction-for-quickened ability when an enemy died.

- They started the one-shot out with a trophy giving them an elemental d6 of bonus damage at level 3, so they're already getting Investigator's bonus damage at that level passively. Not having quarry seems to be more commonly expected than not having a relevant lead, even pre-remaster, so I don't think Slayer is going to be missing out on too much.

- In your Abomination Vaults example, the Slayer is supposed to spend ten minutes looking at tracks before opening a door (when possible), or supposed to talk with the townsfolk/cooperative dungeon residents about rumors for ten minutes before going down.

- In a purely random encounter table situation, the Slayer is probably supposed to talk to people about what's been rumored to be in the area or check tracks and use Monster Lore to figure out what one thing on the random encounter table is, so that they're prepared for something. It'd be good where possible for the GM to pre-roll if somebody's looking for what's been especially active of late. (While I still wouldn't want to play a Slayer in a "random encounters only" game, I also wouldn't want to play in that kind of game with any character.)

- Much like Investigator, I do expect there to be some sort of quarry/trophy-of-opportunity option available. That one is pure speculation, though- the level three character didn't seem to have it.

---

Now, just because the class gets its expected amount of damage without quarry doesn't mean that it can't feel bad to not have quarry. I would be surprised if that weren't a big part of the playtest.

To me, the likelier problem would be a boss being telegraphed too early, and the Slayer has their one quarry slot taken up by something that the group won't fight for another three levels. I remember getting repeatedly Your princess is in another castle'd in Blood Lords, which would feel a lot worse with Slayer.

This is more of a mechanical thing than a character concept, but I do think that Gymnast Swashbuckler will go pretty hard multiclassing into Daredevil once the book actually comes out. You'll be able to get adrenaline and panache off the same action, and adrenaline gives you something more useful to do with the rest of your maneuver turn, leaving you free to save your finisher for the first action of next round at full MAP since panache lasts longer. That's a long way off, but I think that will get me the sort of self-assured troublemaker I've been wanting.

QuidEst wrote:

I mean, obviously the quarry needs to be at least your level? Otherwise, all the slayers will just be going around with a bunch of rat pelts and just lying about it being from something dangerous.

We saw that they've got some nice support for fighting a bunch of mooks, getting Quickened 1 as a reaction each time an enemy goes down.

Well there goes my Dale Gribble character idea.

A friend of mine had the thought of "cowardly Slayer who has a bunch of really unimpressive trophies", so my suggestion to them was to take another class and have it pretend to be a Slayer. Those rat pelts? From a powerful rat king that had the entire city's rodents under its sway! Thaumaturge and Exemplar both give alternate means to empower objects, and make especially good choices.

A few points from a non-rules standpoint:

- It's worth noting that the reference is to a story about a tanuki turning into a teakettle and very much not becoming fireproof in the process.

- A tanuki turning into something valuable and then running off after being sold is something with story precedent. They eventually backstabbed their partner to short-sightedly not split one of the takes.

- Playing a tanuki, it's generally good to lean into The Bit. If a tanuki character turns into a platinum coin to be used as payment for goods, the shopkeeper should bite it, prompting a shout of pain.

A few points from a rules standpoint:

- It is a simple tool or object, with the examples given being a teakettle, an umbrella, or a crowbar. As soon as you're applying special materials, that's no longer simple.

- You can "function as that object for allies to use". You can't function as a rock for the purposes of hardness against an enemy's attack, and the Change Shape rule says you don't get any special abilities of what you turn into.

- Any sufficiently valuable object is going to be examined if it's being used to pay for something, so the Deception check/DC is going to be relevant. Moreover, Teakettle Form lacks the text of Statue Form spelling out that you can convincingly disguise yourself as an object using it. I wouldn't normally use "lack of text used elsewhere" as evidence, but if a player were being a rules lawyer about it, it's something I'd pull out.

- "Too good to be true" rule definitely applies, even setting everything else aside.

---

But, for actual guidance...

- Turning into an object doesn't grant resistances or hardness. You can be used as a tool, even when it seems like that would require resistances or hardness. Non-mechanically, it might not be comfortable.

- Similarly, turning into an object doesn't grant any special material properties, nor are you actually that object. A transformed tanuki is a mundane weapon at best.

- Turning into something valuable to be sold runs the same risk as any counterfeiting. While it's a self-retrieving and reusable scam, that means it's also exposed sooner than a truly good forgery, and with the added risk that being locked in a vault or put in a spacious pouch could mean running out of air.

- While still a bit subjective, anything turned into still needs to be large enough to count as "an object". Grains of sand, motes of dust, etc., aren't something the game treats as objects.

- Finally, as a bit of a general point of consideration, this is a setting where tanuki aren't commonly used as elite infiltration specialists. There's probably a reason for that.

Also, I'm definitely interested in seeing how the slayer works mechanically. The daredevi sounds like it's going to work just fine, but the brief description in the other thread makes me a bit skeptical about the slayer. The quarry having to be at least your level seems like an unnecessary restriction that would only serve to make the class less fun when you're only facing mooks. You would most likely choose to mark the most important foe anyway if you knew there was one strong one and a few weaker ones. The monster part concept sounds cool on paper, but I could see it being problematic, assuming it's supposed to give permanent upgrades. If these upgrades are factored into the class budget, it could just mean that your progression is partially tied to defeating monsters. That would mean that everyone else gets the full benefits of a level up, while you only get a part of your new powers and are now waiting to find a horn to tape onto your sword or something. If these upgrades are not factored in, that would obviously lead to balance issues. I'll just have to read the playtest document once it comes out.

I mean, obviously the quarry needs to be at least your level? Otherwise, all the slayers will just be going around with a bunch of rat pelts and just lying about it being from something dangerous.

We saw that they've got some nice support for fighting a bunch of mooks, getting Quickened 1 as a reaction each time an enemy goes down.

I'd like to suggest that even if folks want to discuss other things, it would be nice to at least include a character idea at the end to stay on topic.

In keeping with that, I've been helping my friend with a Ratfolk Slayer named Shortarm, and his Rat familiar sidekick, Sidearm. Shortarm is a vigilante bounty hunter who wears the bones of the criminals he's killed in a misguided attempt to reassure people of what a Good Person he is because of all the Bad People he's killed. He's got most of the legal code memorized, despite not knowing a lot of the meanings behind the legal terms.

exequiel759 wrote:

Braggart is already taken by a swashbuckler subclass.

Acrobat seems too closely related to Acrobatics for a class name IMO, more so when it sounds like the daredevil leans more towards Str than Dex.

Good thing I'm not naming them then. There's still got be something less anachronistic than daredevil though.

I'm confused why people keep saying it feels anachronistic. It's a very old-timey sounding word to me, one who dares the devil. Looking up the etymology, and yep... "dare devil", from 1684. If you want to give it a more fantasy feel, I think hyphenating it to dare-devil is a good way to go about it.

Now, in fairness, that might just be me. I know that when I told my friend about it, it was a good ten minutes of me talking about what we knew so far before they realized it was a Pathfinder class rather than a Starfinder class meant to ricochet off of spaceship corridors.

moosher12 wrote:

I like that you mention Castlevania and Bloodborne, because Castlevania and Bloodborne are more urban than natural, which is sort of what I mean. And that's what Slayer invokes to me, urban monster fighting. Going into castles, or through dingy urban sprawls.

That's the point of what I'm saying though. The word "hunter" isn't tied to nature nowadays because people associate it with stuff that isn't tied to nature.

Why call it "slayer" then when that word conveys an "assassin", "hitman", or "manslayer" flavor when the class isn't seemingly tied to an urban setting?

I definitely gotta side with "monster slayer" being the implication I get, yeah. Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Demon Slayer, and that sort of thing are what come to mind.

Daredevil makes me finally wanna roll a Vanara, probably Son Wukong coded, whose just a hyped-up chaos-gremlin-brawler. Slayer with alchemist archetype sounds like a better approximation for witcher.

Forgot to mention Sun Wukong-coded Vanara in my concepts, but yeah, that crossed my mind. Definitely less mythical and sturdy than the Exemplar approach, but probably better at being a menace.

For some original ideas, mostly from browsing the uncommon and rare ancestries...

Daredevil Great Kholo. Grab as much armor as the class will allow, and make a bully build shoving people around for bonus damage, tripping, and biting them with the Chomp feat to leave hands free. Having a circumstance bonus to most of your maneuvers is great when the stakes are even higher than for normal checks.

Daredevil Even-Tempered (or Steadfast) Tanuki. Lean into the swinginess, and make the crit fails an equal part of the character. Grab Iron Belly to be able to crash into people, and possibly pick up Priest Form to go from posing as a holy priest to rocketing across the battlefield to tussle with somebody up close.

Daredevil Kobold or Ratfolk. Used to fighting up close in tunnels, dashing up to enemies and picking fights bigger than them. (Red Dragon Inn has a Kobold courier named Jett who has a very parkour-focused fighting style that involves a lot of running into people and bouncing off them.)

Daredevil Tengu or Strix, possibly grabbing Winged Warrior. Recreate the wall-runner archetype from PF1, making a character that is working their way up from "the closest they can get to flight" to full-fledged flying combatant. Being able to eventually get flight and have a fly-and-combat-maneuver action is some amazing action economy. Or, stick with the flightless character if it fits better.

Daredevil Awakened Animal. Seems like a decent option for a weaponless character, using maneuvers and having press actions that add large damage dice regardless of a weak base. Should allow sticking closer to the animal.

Daredevil Catfolk. Take Clawdancer in a free archetype game, and mix multiple stances with maneuvers and action compressed movement for a very fluid combat style.

Slayer Fetchling or Wayang. Collect enemies' shadows as trophies. Wayang can even use them as shadow puppets to recount their victories.

Slayer Kholo. Use the trophy system to give some mechanical weight to eating a part of a fallen enemy to take some of their strength or cunning.

Slayer Kobold or Ratfolk. Getting power from trophies means that it's good for making a character that's clawed their way out of the gutter.

Slayer Tanuki. This one is intentionally borrowing a bit of Thaumaturge's flavor, and leaning into the darker stories that tanuki have about them. A character with no particular knowledge of magic who regularly mistakes bits of mundane jewelry or clothing as being magical, and being willing to kill the owner to get it. (Conveniently, this is something that happens to the party's enemies.) When they get their hands on it, their belief and own internal magic is strong enough to manifest the effects- at least as long as its one of their latest acquisitions and still of interest to them. Eventually, it will be replaced with something newer and shinier, only to be discarded or pawned as the mundane trinket it always was, its magic "used up".

Slayer Hobgoblin. Hobgoblins are very militaristic as a society, and Slayer seems like a good option for a lone Hobgoblin to find work hunting down particular bounties.

Slayer Tengu. Tengu have a particular connection with swords, and the Slayer's Bloodthirsting Sword option feels like it works better at representing care for a particular special sword better than Thaumaturge's Weapon Implement and its "Fighter Lite" vibe.

Slayer Poppet. A storybook character brought to life, ready to vanquish the wicked dragon, or other similarly storybook villain.

Slayer Yaoguai. A generational hunting trophy room or collection that has taken on a life of its own, and seeks to add more trophies to itself.

Slayer Yaksha. Just a particularly natural fit, given Yaksha has built-in oaths, and Slayer targets particular enemies well in advance.

That's right, the new playtest classes have been announced for next Tuesday. I'm sure we'll have a nice blog once they're actually out and available, but I'm willing to get the thread started early.

To help, here are some notes from the stream. Please remember that this is

Slayer, more in the sense of "monster slayer" than in PF1's PF2-Ranger-style class. No more will your Belmonts, your Buffys, and your Van Helsings be best approximated via Thaumaturge. This class spends ten minutes prepping to designate a creature of at least its level as its quarry, getting bonuses to track it and on Monster Lore checks about it. They have a signature item, with one option being the Bloodseeking Blade. Defeating their quarry lets them take a trophy to power up their gear in specific ways. They appear to have plenty of feats and features that work on other enemies too, unlike Ranger who is focused on just one target and needs to switch it regularly.

Daredevil is a class for moving around the battlefield, interacting with map features, and getting more out of maneuvers. They have risky actions that provide added benefits but additional crit fail penalties and fuel adrenaline. Adrenaline lasts for a turn and reduces the MAP of Press actions. The free risky action that all Daredevils get is "Daring Stunt", which allows striding, leaping, or alternate movement-ing at least ten feet (must end next to an enemy) and then grappling, tripping, shoving, or repositioning. They also get bonus damage when they move someone and an obstacle ("prop") blocks part of the movement.

We'll get to see the full picture on Tuesday.

Slayer seems to take an Investigator approach to something that Thaumaturge was kind of given as the best fit for before, the monster hunter. They can designate a quarry, taking ten minutes. They get bonus damage with their signature weapon and various tracking/knowledge bonuses against the quarry, but we saw a lot of their other options work against other enemies. When they take down their quarry, they can take a trophy to empower their gear. Notably, they had support to reaction-quicken for one round on any enemy going down *or* their quarry getting crit- good for mowing through mooks or tackling a boss.

Daredevil seems geared towards addressing how bad it can sometimes feel to use a maneuver and then attack. They get risky action compression for movement and maneuvers, which gives adrenaline. Adrenaline empowers maneuvers (get damage for shoving an enemy into a wall or larger creature/obstacle) and reduces the MAP for Press actions. The class then gets Press actions to upgrade their attacks with.

Is there a specific point in which the requirement for a feat is checked for it to be used or must it always be met?

To be able to use the Twin Takedown feat the requirement is "You are wielding two melee weapons, each in a different hand", and it says "[...]. Make two Strikes against your hunted prey, one with each of the required weapons. [...]"

Now, if the user were to have two shortswords to start, struck with the one in the first hand but lost it for some reason would they still be able to continue with the second strike, even if they wouldn't meet the requirement anymore?

What if instead the user had two daggers with a returning rune on each? It would meet the requirement at the start (and also doesn't specify whether the strike is melee or ranged) but as soon as the first strike is made the thrown weapon would become ranged and "fail" the check. Then as the strike ends the dagger would fly back in the hand of the user, becoming a melee weapon again and thus the requirement would again be met for the second strike.

So, if the requirement must be met for the whole duration then you wouldn't be able to strike again in the first case and you wouldn't be able to throw the weapon in the second case, but if this weren't the case and the condition must be met only at the start you would be to make the second strike and use a thrown weapon.

I think this falls under "this is a TTRPG rather than a video game".

There isn't some rule stating how the "Requirements" section of feat works, so it is well and truly up to the GM. The rules for requirements say: "Sometimes you must have a certain item or be in a certain circumstance to use an ability."

In the case of Twin Takedown, I certainly wouldn't expect to be able to use a melee weapon ability to make thrown attacks, but some GMs would probably let it slide if you talked to them up front. There isn't going to be one definitely-correct answer on how to run requirements edge cases.

A few things I'd enjoy seeing:

A magical trickster class. Something a little more harmoniously integrated than "skill class with a caster archetype welded on", and a little more skill/trick oriented than "Bard uses Performance for a few other skills".

A merchant class. Another items class, covering some of the non-alchemical consumables or getting temporary on-level gear. It'd be nice to have it key off charisma to set it further apart from Alchemist and Runesmith. It might not be feasible to do a good job with this using item categories that weren't designed around it, but it's a type of class I'd still enjoy seeing.

Any kind of build-a-monster class. Synthesist would be wonderful, but I'm okay if it's better to just pull the concept out into its own thing. If it needs to be uncommon or rare, understandable. Sometimes, you just want to put your feats into "being something" rather than "doing something".

Fortunately, we've got a trait for this exact type of spell: Prediction.

Arcane has: Anticipate Peril, Impending Doom, Perseis's (sic) Precautions, True Target, Foresight

Occult has: Anticipate Peril, Augury, Behold the Weave, Impending Doom, Perseis's (sic) Precautions, Read Omens, Inevitable Disaster, Heinous Future, Suspended Retribution, True Target, Foresight

Divine has: Augury, Behold the Weave, Impending Doom, Read Omens, Inevitable Disaster, Heinous Future, Suspended Retribution, Foresight

Occult is the best choice for spells, getting all of them.

However, there is one spell that stands out to me as giving Arcane an edge it's otherwise lacking in the spell department: Contingency. While it's not a Prediction spell, it's easy to flavor it as one.

For focus spells, we have the apocryphal domain spell for Fire, Cinder Gaze, as well as the standard domain spell for Fate, Read Fate. And finally, not coming in until tenth level/fifth rank, Harrow bloodline's Rewrite Possibility.

And, checking out the feats (excluding mythic)... Oracle has Read Disaster, Roll the Bones of Fate (Bones or Lore only), and Thousand Visions. Cleric has Premonition of Avoidance. Witch has Portents of the Haruspex. Of those, the Time Mage archetype steals Read Disaster and Plot the Future, making it a good archetype choice. Between the feats and access to the Fate domain, this is where Oracle more than makes up for the few small spells that Occult has over it.

Special mention for the Harrow bloodline and Harrower archetype, which have a "seeing the future" vibe without actually getting the Prediction trait on anything.

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So... putting it all together, I think if I were making a Seer, there are a few things I'd consider.

Time Oracle, grabbing the Fate domain, picking up Thousand Visions and Read Disaster, and selecting Nyarlathotep (The Veiled Voice) as the level 11 deity to cheekily pick up Contingency access (which is admittedly less impressive on a spontaneous caster).

Only for higher levels, Wizard. Lean into Contingency and make it seem like the trigger was always a prediction. Thesis is Spell Substitution, and make a point of swapping out a spell at each refocus break to adjust to the "shifting tides of the future". Grab the Time Mage archetype to get access to some time-related focus spells and predictive abilities with a vague "seeing the future" feel, or grab Harrower to key off of that high intelligence score and a more fortune-teller vibe. Possibly both, since Time Mage is a late start, and Wizard doesn't really give a lot of on-brand feats for this.

For Occult, Spinner of Threads Witch or Harrow bloodline Sorcerer are easy picks. I'd actually pass on Psychic for this, because you don't really have any predictive feats and it's a lot bigger cost to spend one of your few spells on predictive magic. Same archetype selection as Wizard, because again, we don't have quite the in-class feat support that Oracle is tossing around. Sorcerer can strongly consider picking up Oracle dedication too and pilfering an occasional Oracle feat at a steep delay.

Well, they are listed in the rules--so yes, they are rules. That said, I agree that they are extremely open to interpretation.

Which is why I was hoping to get a few interpretations. :P

Kuthite Mystic would be really good themstics, because they can do healing point by point and be incredibly precise on how much they give.

"Healing someone being tortured in order to continue" is the exact sort of use that Zon-Kuthon would approve of.

More generally, if you're playing a Kuthite Cleric, healing someone up from unconscious is probably okay under most circumstances. Their suffering has already been eased, and you're just bringing them back into it. It would be most proper to use lower-rank slots unless they're expected to be taking more injuries.

Topping someone up between fights, though? That's veering into anathema. Something like Risky Surgery is an excellent workaround. We do have PF1 lore about painful healing that would also work- for some simple flavor, you can say that the healing causes the person to re-experience the sensation of receiving each injury as it's removed.

I'd enjoy getting some sort of painful Kuthite healing spell so it isn't quite so much of an excuse. Knights of Lastwall has a few hitpoint transfer options, and Draconic Codex has Blood-Feasting Breath to steal hitpoints.

My unlikely hope is Shifter or its replacement (should we get one beyond what we have) being Arcane, or at least not Primal-exclusive. We have Druid for Barbarian for Primal shapeshifters, and it would be really nice to bring in some other flavor as well.

When I picture a Pathfinder planar book, it's focused mostly on the planes themselves, their nature, and what traveling to them is like. Rage of Elements is a good example, even if it's only the elemental planes.

For Starfinder, I'm picturing a book that is much more focused on interactions between the universe and the planes. Hell could be presented more through the lens of what archdevils people make what deals with, covering the Hellknights' helldrives and the associated costs, examinations of Hell-controlled worlds in the universe, and things like how common diabolic legal services are. It might feature info on a major "port" for each of the planes.

I think you could have the latter even before the former, although Pathfinder getting a big book on the "divine" planes first would certainly be a little smoother.

They have a higher surface-area-to-volume ratio, so they burn more, have more of themselves coated, lose a larger proportion of their blood, or whatever the persistent damage is. Seems reasonable enough, but I'm not going to fault any GM who decides to only apply it on initial damage.

Oh heck yeah, great to hear there was a quick fix for the issue. Good catch!