Floating Disc is a level 1 spell; Levitate is a level 2 spell. I don't see why there couldn't be some grand "Levitating Disc" spell that's somewhere in the 6-8 realm. Just bring the whole army up on one big invisible floating disc. Bonus points if the spell mixes in some ghost sound for some elevator music; 30,000 ft is a long way.
So, I've always heard here on the forums that the Leadership feat is totally broken, and that no DM should allow it, and if they do, every PC should take it.
My question is: why?
What makes Leadership so broken? Is it the extra cohort you get? Or the veritable army of underlings? Is it too much action economy? Too disruptive to the table? Too much book-keeping?
What makes Leadership so broken?
Is there a way to make it less/not broken? Maybe only allow the cohort, but no underlings? All of the characters are in the DMs control? Something else? If you could "fix" Leadership, how would you change it, while keeping it as intact as possible, such that you would allow it at your table.
(The main reason I ask this is because I have a fellow player who has asked to take the feat; our DM has not answered yet, but my default assumption was the answer would be no, since that's what I always hear the default answer should be. However, it got me to thinking that I've never really heard WHY it shouldn't be allowed; only that it shouldn't. Also, it seems like it could make for some good flavor, like, for example, if a player wants to start a business or mercenary band or some such. However, I know there are downtime rules for such things, and they are both money and time intensive. So using a feat to circumvent much of that could be way too powerful.)
She seems like the gymnast/acrobat type, so Swashbuckler seems pretty fitting actually. Maybe not the "perfectly poised to defend and counterattack" fencer type of Swashbuckler, but definitely the "bouncing all over the place, impossible to hit a moving target, cutting you down with a million stings" kind of Swashbuckler.
I was kind of thinking the same thing about the Nameless One (haven't seen any of the sub feats; just the initial one). It says you have to give up any identities, including ones you get from classes, so that throws Vigilante right out. And the whole point of it is to remain this nameless/faceless identity you create, and never look like anyone else. That's practically the opposite of what a Faceless Man does.
When asked why they print "bad cards" for Magic, I've seen WotC use the excuse that they make some cards better than others to try and teach new players to compare cards in order to help them learn to tell bad cards from good.
You could make the same argument for RPG elements; without bad feats/items, we wouldn't appreciate the good ones. However, it doesn't help when errata/FAQs create a constant churn of what is and isn't good.
My argument to this, though, is that they they/we wouldn't have to differentiate between good and bad if the bad was never created in the first place.
Though a counter-point to THAT would be that a product line can't be around this long, while constantly putting out new stuff that doesn't currently exist, and not manage to print something that isn't up to snuff. Odds are, with the high demand for more new and interesting content, that trying to meet that demand will cause some things to be released that are either over- or under- whelming.
So, we end up with some stuff that is "overpowered" that everyone suggests taking. With all of the guides out there, we end up with what are essentially sorted lists of feats/items, from best to worst. Granted, there can be cases for some items to be higher on the lists than others, and that's good; items are more interesting when they are really good for some builds and not so much for others (like the Brawling enchantment). But when an item ends up at the top for everyone (Big 6 for example) it could indicate a problem.
My counter to that, though, would be: is it a problem? Do we want everything to be so perfectly balanced that everything would be rated black/green in a guide? Do we want game content that is so amazingly balanced to the point of mediocrity? Such that nothing stands out and there is nothing to get overly excited about?
I think this is where people differ. Some would say "yes, if I compare two options (be they feats, items, whatever) that require the same resource investment, I want to feel like both are equally desirable". Others would say "no, I like that there are stand-out options that are head and shoulders above their contenders."
The problem here is that, usually, in many game systems, options aren't as clear-cut as being better or worse; it should depend on the build (again, like the Brawling enchantment). Options should be interesting by being better than a generic option but for a smaller set of scenarios. That way, if you are trying for a specific niche-build, you have options that make you even better at that niche build.
The further problem is that, in Pathfinder, generic options are typically better (the Big 6 being the best example here). Everyone benefits from have better AC, everyone benefits from having a better attack bonus (melee, archer, touch attack spells), everyone benefits from having better saves. So there is no reason to get other interesting abilities, when the generic ones provided are so widely useful.
When something comes along that does give a more attractive, but niche, bonus/ability, it attracts attention because it's something different to do. This invariably leads to more builds popping up that use it. Which invariably leads to people trying to figure out ways to make that niche more generic, and therefore more usable. A good example of this would be Fates Fortune. Most people would consider that a niche option: "increase Luck bonuses? you hardly ever get those, only this one race and/or class could make use of that". But then, as more and more material is printed, those Luck bonuses become more prevalent. Now, what was a niche option, becomes much easier to use for any build. The niche has become generically usable, but because it was originally made better than the generic option (but for niche situations), it's better than the normal generic option. And so it's deemed nerf-worthy.
And it's a vicious cycle that affects pretty much every game that involves choosing a limited set of resources from a vast sea of options. A game starts out with a small set, where nothing is especially shinier than anything else. Demand for more content causes increase in options, which are tacked on, but this causes some options to stand out more than others until they get hammered back down to the same level as everything else, which becomes increasingly harder to do as more and more options, and therefore more and more interactions between options, become available. It gets to the point that the developer can't release content without it having a bad reaction with something (or causing discontent for someone, since you can't please everybody), and then we get a new version instead.
I honestly don't see why anyone is surprised, or having heartburn over this; I would have thought people would be used to it by now. Note: I DO get why people get upset when they think something is over/under-nerfed; I'm not saying I don't get that. What I'm saying is errata shouldn't be surprising, and the fact that some people are pleased with it and some people aren't also shouldn't be surprising. You can express which side you are on, but you shouldn't be surprised that there are people on the other side.
The only fix I could ever see for this is by including niche options that are somehow unable to be used generically, but even then, some future option, that the developers maybe didn't foresee printing when they made the original niche option, could still end up opening the niche option up for less niche builds. I suppose extremely restricted options could be the norm, like "this option can only be chosen by X". But prerequisites like that already exist. The problem there is that there is always demand for being able to mix and match, so restricting that becomes unpopular. And such restrictions end up getting circumvented by mixing and matching (1-level dips are good examples of this).
TLDR: As a fan of the Brawler, unarmed combat, and grapple checks, I'm saddened to hear their options have narrowed.
While that would be an effective death trap, I don't think it would qualify as a sanctuary. You probably wouldn't want to live there either.
It's interesting actually - the compromises that many ancient fortifications made so that they would actually be livable structures. They knew that they were a bit less secure that way, but there's a limit to what you're willing to put up with on a daily basis.
The latest episodes of Peldor are about this exact thing (and this entire topic really). The more impenetrable you make a location, the more of a hassle it is to frequent the location. If you have to jump through 100 hoops to enter/exit your lair, you're gonna get tired of jumping through those hoops, and probably eventually start cutting corners. That's why I said it's best to make an impenetrable fortress that you never plan to leave. Like dungeons and their bosses, or pharaohs and their pyramids; they weren't designed for people to come and go, they were designed to keep people out, and that's it.
You could ignore the RP element of it all, and just say there are 10,000 hoops to jump through to enter/exit your lair, and it takes a weeks worth of journeying, spellcasting, etc. to bypass/setup all of the obstacles, and your character is happy to do it. In reality, your character would go insane doing this over and over, or would have to already be insane to be this paranoid; to the point that your character shouldn't be under your control any more.
The entire problem with the subject in the first place is that, no matter what you do, no matter where you draw the line and say "ok, this is secure enough, it would take X amount of effort to get past all this" where X is what you consider to be an unreachable amount of effort, someone could come along and say "hm, it takes X amount of effort huh? I can can do X amount of effort."
Really the only way to be truly impenetrable is for there to not be anyone/anything else that would/could want to penetrate it. So the answer is to use the supposedly "infinite resources" to just destroy everything else in the multiverse, leaving your humble fortress in a vacuum in which it is completely safe.
This makes me think of the movie Snowpiercer, about a train on a constant loop around the earth, because reasons.
One idea could be that the planet on which it is set turns very slowly, or is very big. So that the day/night cycle is extremely long. Spend too long on the day side and your roast, but spend too long on the night side and you freeze. So you have to constantly run from/towards the sun, depending on if you live on the rising or setting side of the planet. Maybe it turns at just the right speed so that there is a strip of biosphere along the edges, in which there is life, but as it slowly turns into the sun, the plants and other life slowly dies out as the beating sun gradually evaporates all the water and burns away all life until it's nothing but a blazing desert, until finally it circles around to the other side, where it cools off again, and the waters flowing in from the frozen side re-saturate the ground and new life, buried in seeds beneath the sun-baked earth, springs anew.
Could even have a cool West/East tribe type deal, where people speak of a mysterious tribe that lives on the other side of the planet, but no one who has ever tried to make the trek there has returned.
Whenever the GM or other players said "SERIOUSLY?" in real life, he just ranted about how he's only playing his character correctly, its a roleplaying game, blah blah blah, and he could shout pretty loud in real life too, everyone including me just rolled our eyes and let him, hence why when i suggested swapping characters to barbarian, the GM jumped on the idea. The problem player was bringing a sour tone to the whole table after all, but DAMN was he imposing and stubborn in real life.
This seems like a clear-cut case of someone being "lawful stupid". A player chooses how to play and portray their character, and a Paladin can be the "shining example of righteousness" type of paladin. One who recognizes that not everyone is as righteous as he, and so does not try to force their righteousness on others (assuming the others aren't down-right evil). Just because your character was a rogueish type with a certain set of skills that implies they aren't always on the up-and-up (i.e.: probably of chaotic alignment, most likey CN) doesn't give the Paladin the right to just immediately dismiss you. Paladins typically are non-tolerant of evil and just non-apporiving of chaos. Assuming your character didn't commit overtly evil acts and didn't offend whatever particular code the Paladin has, you should have been fine. When a player comes to the table with the intent of playing the "lawful stupid" paladin, just "because that's how paladins are", they are either purposely being disruptive or they haven't had the above comparison laid out for them. As has been pointed out a whole bunch in this thread, this game is first and foremost a social experience in which you have to be able to at least tolerate the other players and their characters. Paladins are included because they can be cool characters, but they shouldn't be RPed to the point of not fitting into the social construct of the rest of the party.
I don't want to imply anything, but one thing I haven't seen mentioned (maybe I missed it) is this: maybe they're all trying to make some point to you? I can't imagine what slight or problem they have with you that would make them all plot this behind your back and treat you like an outsider, but it seems like too much of a coincidence for all the other players to make similarly "loner" characters, and all acting so shut-off from your character. That seems like coordinated intent to me.
Again, I'm not trying to imply you've done something to bring this upon yourself, but maybe they feel that way.
How feasible is it to run a Dwarf Kineticist that never wants to take Burn damage?
I ask because I want to make a tanky character based on an Dwarf Earth Kineticist, but I still want to be able to utilize thinks like Diehard and/or Flagellant. But Burn makes them useless.
Does refusing to take Burn neuter the class too hard to make it worthwhile?
Based off item creation estimates, I don't see why a "Bag of Abundant Ammunition" wouldn't be too hard to create/allow as a custom magic item. Spell level (1) x caster level (1) x 2,000GP x 2 (spell measured in minutes/level) x 2 (no body slot) = 8,000 gp. I'd even toss in a "handy haversack" effect in that it still only weighed 1/2 lb (based off a belt pouch). Such a bag could theoretically produce an unlimited amount of almost any ammunition of almost any material (add in the cost of rare materials to creation of the item, or just drop in special material ammunition as you gain it), so you could argue for a price reduction if it only produced shuriken.
If you have a caster in your group, add in the cost of a level 3 pearl of power (9,000 gp) so they can cast Greater Magic Weapon on your bag for you and you have a scaling weapon that costs 17,000 gp.
If you don't have a caster, would have to work it out with the GM to "enchant" the bag as if it were a weapon. Since Abundant Ammunition states that casting something on the bag, after Abundant Ammunition is applied, applies that effect to the ammunition produced, I wouldn't see any harm in allowing such a thing. It's just as expensive as the Ranger enchanting their bow except you start with an 8,000gp bag as your base weapon and they start with a bow that costs less than 1,000gp.
1) Ring is created.
1a) Ring immediately activates upon creation.
1b) Anti-Magic Field is created.
2) AMF suppresses ring effect.
2a) AMF dissolves.
3) Lack of AMF causes ring to reactivate.
3b) Proceed to step 1b.
This results in, basically, a constantly shuttering AMF; a strobe-like AMF. It is both on and off. It is Shcrodinger's Anti-Magic Field.
I'd propose that it act somewhat like the Blink spell, in that any instantaneous magic (including activated magic items) in the area has a 50% chance of being affected by the field, and a 50% chance of occurring while the ring is in it's off-state, and therefore ocurring normally. Any spellcasting has a 50% chance of failure (separate from ASF). Any continuous magic effects that would NOT re-activate automatically if they left an AMF are shut off. Any continuous magic effects that WOULD re-activate after leaving an AMF have a 50% chance of being active at any given time. Attacking with a magic weapon? You have a 50% chance of gaining the bonus. Using your Str while wearing a Str-boosting belt? 50% chance of gaining the enhancement bonus.
Any one action only requires a single roll to determine if magic items are on or off for that action; so don't have to roll for every single magic item that is affecting your action.
I think Magic SHOULD do better than base skills. Magic is limited after all. That Bard can only use his spells so many times a day. A highly-trained Bluffer can Bluff all day long (within physical time limits of course).
Now granted, the whole idea of "Magic is limited to a certain amount per day, and should therefore be allowed to be stronger than things that aren't" (see God Wizard vs Fighter) flies out the window when the GM allows rests too often. A Wizard that is given the time to re-study as often as needed to always keep his spell slots fresh will be...well, a God Wizard. This is the reason high-level Fighters don't feel so shiny. The fact that they can swing their sword all day falls to the way side if the Wizard never runs out of spells.
That being said, I'm in the camp of: Bluffing works insofar as the target will believe what you told them, however, it's up the the GM to determine what the NPC does with their newfound information. I especially like the idea of following up a successful Bluff with Diplomacy. If you Bluff an NPC into thinking you're part of their group, that group might still have protocols you have to follow and probably responses for when protocols aren't followed; the guard is a good example of this. When trying to Bluff a king into turning over treasure, you have to realize that just because they BELIEVE you're on a great mission doesn't mean they are immediately ready to just do whatever you ask of them. The more dire you try to make the mission sound, in order to try to leverage more support for this "world-ending threat", the less likely someone is to believe. If you try to push your Bluff into such a state that you are expecting the King to hand over the keys to the treasury, the kingdom, and his wives and daughters chastity belts because your "cause is so great", I'm afraid that's where the GM should probably step in and say "that's too improbable, you can't make them believe that".
So, in essence, it's like two opposed graphs, where one starts out high and gets lower while the other starts out low and gets higher.
The results you want to get are inversely related to how improbable the lie you are telling is. Instead of getting greedy and trying to use Bluff as a magic key to all social interactions, you need to accept that settling for something towards the middle is best for game balance.
If you want to boost your skills even more, you could drop one of your first level feats and take the Focused Study trait for Human. Instead of your normal bonus feat at first level, you get a Skill Focus of your choice, but then you also get another one at 8th level and then another one at 16th. Don't know if you will be getting to 16th or not, but that means you'd have 2 Skill Focus feats of your choice right now by giving up either Improved Initiative or Spell Focus. And you're only 2 levels away from them upgrading to +6 instead of +3. If a Human ever plans to take Skill Focus, this is typically the way to go since you get 2 extra free feats essentially. The only way I could imagine it not working is if you just really need certain feats earlier on in order to qualify for later feats at the right points.
The current character I'm playing is Strength 22, large-sized, with the Muscle of the Society trait (+2 Str for purposes of carrying capacity).
I could almost carry the entire party and their gear on my back. I could definitely pull a wagon with the party in it.
Aside from that, our group doesn't normally care too much about carrying capacity. For the most part, our GM/DM has always assumed we were being legit about our carrying capacity, and as far as I know, all of our players have always done so. We haven't had very many campaigns where it came up.
Though we did have one time where the party had a barrel of holding with all the party loot in it. It fell down a shaft and shattered, spilling the contents, and we had to figure out how to get all of our loot out of the cave system we were in. One of the players spent an hour or two calculating weight-to-worth ratios, item priority, each characters weight capacity to figure out how to most efficiently divvy everything up and leave the least stuff behind. Then when he was almost done, we got the idea to fashion a rough sled/sledge from some adamantine bars we had in the barrel. I think he died a little inside that day.
I've always assumed Barbarians were the kings of DPR, but I've never stopped to look at the numbers before. Weapon Training means a Fighter is keeping up with a Barbarian with regards to bonuses to att/dmg, and access to Specialization combined with bonus feats means a Fighter seems to pull ahead.
I agree that actual play experience may not always match DPR calculations, and as you stated, Barbarians have some tricks for getting in extra attacks, which can help them at least catch back up, if not pull ahead. This is almost always at the expense of something to the Barbarian though. This is also difficult to factor in when considering DPR calculations, which is why they aren't always reliable.
I think that I get the general gist. Vital Strike chain has a use: it's useful for attacking while still being able to make tactical movements, or using your move action for something else, but full-attacking is where the DPR is. It's what I assumed, but I guess when I saw "optimized Vital Strike build" mentioned in other threads, I thought it was meant as "can compete with full-attack builds" and not "as optimized as a build built around Vital Strike can be". I now understand the pros and cons correctly though.
I would add that it does seem like coming by Pounce isn't as easy to do as some people seem to think, but not as hard as others seem to think. If you build around full-attacking, you should be prepared to either a) get Pounce, b) learn to kite enemies effectively, or c) take a hit to your DPR until you an close.
The problem I see with b), though is that some enemies can't be kited. Other "brute" builds, like multi-natural attack animals might fall for it, but higher level threats will have ranged options that they are willing to resort to.
I think I would be more interested in Vital Strike if it wasn't so constricted on its use. As was pointed out, it seems like a minefield of "you can't use Vital Strike with <this>" and "you can't use Vital Strike with <that>". When you get right down to it, it seems like a lot of feats to invest to make your first hit a little better. Because next round, you're already engaged and your full-attacking buddy is going to out perform you, because he spent all his feat slots on making all his attacks better, while you spent them making your one attack better.
As to the "3/4 BABs" can use it: that's more of what I was looking for. Builds that can utilize Vital Strike because they can't full-attack as well. That's the kind of pro/con comparison I was looking for. If the Fighter/Barbarian/Ranger wants to full-attack, what about the Rogue/Bard/Magus? The problem I see with 3/4 BAB builds is they usually have something else they want to be able to do, other than DPR. Rogues want to sneak and stop traps, Bards want to buff and/or heal, Magi want to be better at casting. What I'm getting at is it doesn't seem like even 3/4 BAB builds want to spare all the feats it takes to make Vital Strike useful; they'd rather use those feats on versatility, or whatever their non-DPR related role is. I suppose if you have a player that absolutely want's to use a 3/4 BAB class for some reason, but wants to be able to hit hard as well, maybe Vital Strike becomes a good option? Thoughts?
Ive recently become interested in an Improvised Weapons build, and have found that there is some decent support in both Paizo and 3pp content, including races, feats, traits, and classes/archetypes that can effectively utilize improvised weapons. It doesnt even seem that feat intensive.
That being said, how legitimate can an improvised weapon build be when you can't get weapon enhancements? I see that the Monk of the Empty Hand can use ki to temporarily enchant their improvised weapons, but it is a steep ki expenditure, and only lasts a round. I realize that at lower levels, it won't matter as much, but at mid to higher levels, the gap obviously grows worse. Is there any way for such a build to keep pace, or are improvised weapon builds only viable at lower levels, where magic weapons don't have as much of an impact?
I looked into that exact Race/Class combination for what I called a "Golemancer". The intent was to be able to make an army of Golems. Some feats you might be interested in:
Master Craftsman (free from Artisan)
Master Artificer
Craft Anywhere
Fast Item Creation
Frugal Crafting
Craftsman
Prodigy
Skill Focus
Probably not what you're looking for, but there's also the "stupid pacifist". Think big dumb brute that likes to "play" wrestle. He hugs his opponents until they "go to sleep". He calls a lot of people George.
I want to build a dedicated spell-blaster build, that is as focused on electricity damage as possible, and gets immunity to it eventually, if possible.
Two different version I'm considering are:
1) Druid with both the Storm Druid and Storm Lord archetypes, and taking both the Air and Storm domains, thanks to the Storm Druids Wind Lord ability at 9th. This would provide me with plenty of selection of spells, and would allow me to fill in for when our healer isn't around (a possible concern)
2) Sorcerer with Elemental (Air) bloodline. I like this version, because it is a spontaneous caster, which I prefer, but it would be slightly less versatile due to its lower selection of spells. It gives me more versatility on what spells to choose though, since I turn them all into electricity (so I can take Fireball and still deal electrical damage). It does, however, have fewer spell-like abilities, as the Druid gets numerous abilities from it two domains and from the Storm Lord series.
Which is more highly suggested, if either? If neither, what would be the suggested build for an Electromancer?
