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Alright, and I've worked on this a bit, put it together in a readable format, and added some fluff and stuff before exporting a copy to PDF and sticking it on a google drive. Consider this version 1.2 of the Shadow Illusionist (name still subject to change when I figure out a better one).

I decided after looking back through the summoning spells that the "summon" trait is already pretty good at balancing those, especially if the focus spell for semi-real creatures is actually copying from existing summon spells, but the changes to the creatures through the spell and ability to have them look like something unrelated to the statblock you pull their abilities from (at risk of making people much more likely to try to disbelieve it if you go too far) was enough to make it unique and separate from normal summon spells.

I've separated out just the Shadow Illusionist stuff for this, aside from one extra cantrip more intended for the Shadowcaster rework I'm also working on to put in the full supplement. So please feel free to give feedback and suggestions, or let me know if something isn't clear to a reader who didn't write this mess themselves.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Edj8MknqmY450Bvxn7jQT071_qwSl5on/view

Right then. Main strength for the Shadow Magic illusionist in particular is meant to be flexibility and trickery at the cost of some power. And yes, some vulnerabilities to disbelieving (though a little less than normal illusions) and/or counteracting with light effects. I don't want any of the shadow illusion options to actually be explicitly stronger at what they do than a spell that's focused on doing that specific thing, especially since the shadow mage would still have the base illusions and other spells on their list.

I think for the summon aspect, part of my concern was the risk of creatures with abilities that are way more powerful than you'd expect for the level, and literally having the entire list of monsters as options is going to slow gameplay... but so would something with building a monster each time unless the traits are kept very simple.

So... either "can copy the traits and abilities of a creature that could be summoned from another existing summoning spell of lower rank than the illusion" to reduce the list size but still give a lot of flexibility, or a more simplified list of bonuses that can be applied that scale on spell rank with a "pick only 3" attached maybe.

Either way, I think having a base chassis that's based on the spell rank and the caster's spell casting does work to make it feel like it's an illusion shaped into whatever it's looking like, rather than actually just casting summoning spells.

But just based on how they were handling shadow blast and such... Maybe going with a simple but flexible set of abilities to pick from to modify it, and then have a later feat to let you change the abilities and appearance of a shadow illusion creature without needing to cast a new spell. Then take a similar course for the other options. Avoiding actually "copying other spells" feels like the best way to avoid stepping on other casters' toes and making it easier to balance.

...I also think I'll have the light weakness for the other shadow users who aren't wrapping the shadow magic in illusions, but with the shadow illusionist having the disbelief option be fairly strong when it does come up.

Alright, here's an issue I'm running into while making some of these features and options - how much versatility is too much?
Should shadow summon creatures made from illusions be able to replicate the abilities of actual creatures that are of a low enough level? (Level <= spell rank, for example)? Actual summon spells scale past that, so it should be fine... but this wouldn't be as limited in the types of summons. So far, I've put a nix on any actual spell casting for creatures created with shadow illusions, but should other abilities be allowed or not?

Should I go completely with a "build your own summon" that doesn't have many options for exotic abilities? Or leave being able to pick stuff that already exists given it would be restricted to abilities off of creatures half the party's level and below?

Likewise, for any semi-real objects, should they be able to mimic actual items of low enough levels? Or focus just on more general structures, objects and terrain? Maybe keep mimicking lower level items to an archetype more dedicated to creating equipment things like that? Or just have the more specialized archetype be stronger at it, but still give a weaker version as an option for the versatile shadow illusion mage?

I've definitely noticed that I need to include a lot of clarifications for situations that could come up simply due to experience with unclear rules - though I might should put some of those in a separate sidebar next to the actual feats in question - but the more options a single ability technically has, the more things it feels like need to be mentioned to try to cover all the bases with rules.

I am very much aware of the existing legacy Shadowcaster archetype, but unfortunately it really, really leaves a lot to be desired for the particular things I was looking for. The legacy archetype's main uses are adding spells to a primal or divine caster's list, helping a party rogue hide in combat to get off sneak attacks, and generally give some basic support to skills for hiding and distracting enemies.

I won't say the idea of it is bad, and even if I feel like the implementation is underwhelming at times, if we had more and better shadow spells to grant it would instantly feel a lot better. Though I'd still want to tinker some with the shadowspell metamagic and a few of the focus spells it got, maybe give some more flavorful feats to support the shadow magic... but I'm getting off track.

I feel like there's easily room for at least two or three extra archetypes for shadow magic beyond what we had, and the legacy shadowcaster really doesn't actively try to do anything but "make darkness and be sneaky" with its feat selections. Which Shadowdancer honestly was already doing.

One for focusing on the more malleable shadow illusions that blur the lines of illusion and reality, which is the thing I felt the lack of the most clearly when going through everything. One for a martial character to cloak themselves in shadowy armor, weapons, and tools that let them always have the right option for a fight. And then one to focus more on the darkness itself as a weapon, stealing shadows, and using the netherworld's power unfiltered.

Shadow Illusionist, Shadow Smith, and Shadowcaster. And then keep Shadowdancer for the sneaky teleporting through shadows archetype that brings the darkness with them to hide in.

...Shoot, now I'm thinking of just doing an entire supplement for shadow magic in general with several archetypes, extra spells and focus spells, and rituals and equipment.

Don't forget that Shadow Siphon treats its counteract level as 2 higher, so using a 5th level spell slot has it treated as a 7th level counteract. So even on a failure (as long as it's not a critical failure), it will counteract a 6th rank effect, so a level 11-12 creature's ability or lower.

So yeah, that's the big advantage for Shadow Siphon - you're only halving damage, not fully countering things you target with it, but you can use it at a lower level than what you're trying to counteract than you'd normally need to use, and if you use one that's just one rank below what you're countering, you still do it even if you fail, as long as you don't fail by 10 or more.

Even without up-casting, if you're confident you'll roll a normal success, you can counteract an 8th rank (level 15-16) effect with the base 5th level slot for it.

Something I've always loved the flavor of since seeing it back in D&D 3.5 and pathfinder 1.0 was the specific sort of shadow magic that was introduced through things like shadow evocation and shadow conjuration. The spells themselves weren't generally great on their own, but the idea behind them really inspired my imagination for them. All the more with some of the Prestige Classes in 3.5, and the handful of feats and class features tied to the ideas in Pathfinder 1.0.

Illusions made to affect the world through shadows woven into them. Taking the uncertainty of what might or might not exist in the darkness, and using that to trick reality itself into believing your illusions are real. Versatile abilities that combine trickery with actual utility and combat options. Or even just one last surprise out of an illusion that enemies have already "figured out" and think is safe to ignore, even for the members who don't have the will save to properly disbelieve it.

Pathfinder 2nd edition... honestly didn't bring in all that much of that old shadow magic. It brought in a mix of spells and focus abilities that were meant to give a nod to that alongside ones actually focused on darkness... but more than a few felt unfinished, like the "shadow illusion" focus spell. Or just heavily underpowered like with the Shadow Blast spell. And a lot of options just felt like they were missing all together.

The remaster hasn't even touched nearly anything on this except the Shadow Blast spell, which was given an extra d8 base damage and otherwise left alone, so I figured I'd see about making something for it myself.

Of course, there's more than a few ways to handle giving out the abilities through an archetype: It could work primarily through Focus spells alongside some feats to give boosts for low light levels, or it could work mostly through taking spellshape feats to modify existing illusions to do new things. Or it could work through unique actions that could use existing illusions and spells with the shadow trait.

And alongside picking out how to primarily work them in, there's balancing something where I am aware I'll have a bias towards it, and thus be at risk of either over-tuning the options or overcompensating for my bias and under-powering them, or even a mix.

So, I figured I'd see what people on the forums here thought and see if I could get some help fine-tuning and making decisions on things.

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Option 1 - Focus spells.

Working through focus spells is honestly probably one of the simplest ways to handle this. Each specific feat and focus spell can have another option that isn't covered, it's easy to add onto with more later, it uses an already existing system that has a good few related feats...

Of course, this also ends up having the weaknesses of the focus point system, and it separates the abilities from a lot of other spell casting abilities or features.

I'd probably be thinking between 3-5 focus spells, alongside any other feats. Something for a shadow version of illusory creature / summon spells, something similar to the Ephemeral Hazards focus spell from the premaster, something for partially real structures and walls that could be selectively moved through... and possibly something for tools or equipment pulled out of shadows to suit a situation. Maybe a weaker but more general focus cantrip that could do a weaker, smaller, more limited version of any of the above as well.

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Option 2 - Spellshape feat(s).

Actively taking existing illusion spells and letting them do new things, changing how they work, and using them to mimic slightly weaker versions of spells that just might not be on the caster's spell list. It's more in line with some of the original inspirations, like the 3.5 Shadowcraft mage, and could have some interesting options.

Most of the spells that would be used with this are gotten from low levels, like illusory disguise, illusory object, and illusory creature. Including extra upcasting bonuses in the spellshape's damage / HP and hardness all being based on the rank of the spell it's used with would stretch those already fairly good spells to having reasons to upcast them at just about nearly any level, in the right circumstances. And it could still work with other illusion spells that met some simple requirement of creating the illusion of a visual effect that isn't fully mental, and could reasonably mimic objects, creatures, or damaging effects.

Of course, that is both an advantage and disadvantage, because that means there's a lot more room for arguing on if a given illusion not explicitly called out works with the given spellshape feat or not, and the risk of unintended interactions with new illusions that haven't been released yet. It shouldn't be too hard to do some future proofing, but it is one extra variable to consider if going this route.

Like... what if phantom crowd is remastered, or a player takes it in a game that's allowing premaster spells still, and argues that it should be able to make an entire swarm of creatures that each have HP and take up space with the same spellshape feat that would normally let you give an illusory creature some HP and remove its 'all nonlethal mental damage' restriction? Should it work? Should the crowd of creatures be unable to attack since the base spell doesn't let them attack? Obviously they shouldn't just all be able to act separately as they want, since otherwise it just becomes a much, much better version of illusory creature when both are affected by the spellshape. But it's something that has to be thought about and included in designing a spellshape option.

And would it make sense to make a single spellshape for weaving shadows into illusions, and then have the rest of the archetype be a mix of supporting abilities like dark vision / greater dark vision, abilities to strengthen the shadow spells when cast in areas of darkness and such? Or include just as many spellshape feats as it would have had focus spell feats if going with option 1?

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Option 3 - special actions.

Something of an in between option to the previous two, giving the archetype feats to grant actions that can be taken to do things with existing illusions that are already cast.

Shadow strike, to cause someone adjacent to an illusion to have a melee spell attack made on them from say... a brick falling off the illusionary brick wall. Or an extra attack made by the illusion of a creature, even if it's not normally a spell that could make an attack.

Solidify Shadows, to cause an illusion to Briefly gain hardness and HP for either 1 round or 1 minute or something, allowing that illusion of a bridge to work for your party, but not for a pursuing enemy group, for instance. Or turning your concealing illusion wall that you can walk through into hard total cover behind you after you ran through it. Or making it so that an illusory creature won't be instantly dispelled with a single hit.

Shadow Grasp/Grasping shadows, to cause a creature that's in the area of effect of an illusion or adjacent to one to suddenly get grabbed by the illusory creature, or snagged by a nail in the illusory object of a log cabin. Maybe even being able to grab and move someone, but when they break free and attempt to attack or destroy whatever grabbed them, it's all just smoke in the wind.

Shadow Burst, take an action to have an illusion that looks like it should be damaging, like spikes or a sea of fire... to actually deal damage to all creatures in its area of effect.

Probably each of the actions would be 1/round or have the flourish trait for some balance. The advantage for this setup is that, like with the focus spells, it's easy to add new actions, and since what you can do is a lot more spelled out and has an action cost to it, it's less likely for new spells to break the balance on them. Likewise though, you still interact with the spells, so having a bunch of permanent illusory objects around your base to create lava pits, fake spike traps in the walls, false walls you can retreat through and such... suddenly gives you a bunch of extra actions in your fortified lair / base camp. You can prepare a battlefield and such.

But, you don't have to worry about someone leaving behind those same things as actual real constantly harmful effects or something. Making the illusion act like something other than an illusion requires the caster to be actively spending actions and be present.

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For the spellshape options, there'd probably need to be some balancing addition of bright light making counteract attempts on them, where a torch wouldn't do much but say... the actual sun shining right on them might counteract the shadow magic, and same for a high level light spell. Possibly the same with the focus spell options, or could just have the focus spells need to target an initial area that is dimly lit or dark.

General balancing I'm thinking so far for numbers is mostly thrown together after a bit of looking at existing spells, and aiming for a bit weaker than any specialized fully real options - use the caster's spell attack / save DCs for attack bonuses, skill check bonuses for things like grab/trip/shove, and AC. Then have objects get hardness = spell rank x2 and HP = spell rank x8 per 10 foot long x 10 foot high x 5 foot wide section of structures, or halved for something that only takes up a 5 foot square like a door made with figment. Creatures getting 5+10/rank HP (or 5/rank for cantrip version with figment that has to stay within 30 feet of the caster at all times). And damage numbers based on illusory creature for creatures (1d4+1d4/rank, or just 1d4/rank + spell casting modifier), while area damage effects would be 1d6/rank for a 1/round effect such as a trap or using the special action for a shadow damage burst, or 1d6 per two ranks for hazardous terrain that deals damage for moving through it or starting a turn in it, potentially multiple times in a round. Probably with everything targeting will saves / will defense instead of the "higher of two defenses" that shadow blast has, since already having lower general stats for spell rank than an actual damage spell or summon / wall spell is already a balance, plus I have thoughts for "disbelieving" options and the option of light spells allowing counteracting on focus spells or spellshaped shadow illusions.

So, thoughts? Suggestions? Ideas for something I haven't considered?

TL;DR: Old shadow illusion spells and features were neat. Where they at? Should an archetype use Focus spells, special actions, or metamagic/spellshape feats to do them? What other abilities should a shadow mage archetype that's focused on making semi-real illusions have?

Not quite sure if it should be a class option or an archetype update, but SOMETHING needs to be done to bring back a shadow mage that isn't what we got with the pre remaster shadowcaster archetype.

We do technically have a few spells and feats that have been updated to the remaster... but even then, there's some serious issues. Shadow blast targeting the higher of two saves even though it already was balanced out with smaller AOE than similar level blasting spells (and not getting it until 5th rank) and slightly lower average damage; Shadow illusion not actually having any changes from illusory creature or illusory object other than being a focus spell with slightly lower damage than the upcast illusory object would have, even though the whole point of shadow spells being that they're more than illusions but less than reality.

The particular class fantasy of the illusionist who becomes so skilled at lying that they can briefly trick reality itself, so long as they embrace the uncertainty of the shadows... just really doesn't exist yet in pathfinder 2e. And it's a honestly a shame. What's worse is that I don't really expect it to get fixed up properly anytime soon, in part specifically because shadow blast and shadow illusion are already part of the remaster, and thus unlikely to be revisited again despite their clear flaws.

I'd love to be wrong and see an actual shadowcaster class that goes all in though, or at least an archetype cleanup that both fits the flavor and gives a solid toolkit to use. Being able to use uncertainty and presentation to weaponize fear and belief to make your illusions as good as real. Priming enemies with lies, boasts and intimidation to leave them that much more vulnerable to your spells.

So, I can definitely see where some clarification would be needed from the spell after reading it again. "An illusion of a large or smaller creature" is about all the actual direction it gives for the limits of what the creature can and cannot do, really. The illusion can use 2 actions per turn, the same as most minions, and triggers those when you sustain, so that means no reactions. But otherwise, the reading of the spell never says it can or can not do any specific actions beyond "attacks" and "strikes" being called out. It doesn't technically say that you can move it, but also doesn't say that it can't move, or what it's movement speed is - but that it can flank, that it has to stay within 500 feet of the caster or the spell ends, and has 2 actions to use.

I'd guess that there's an assumption that you pick a creature that exists for it to mimic, and use the movement speed of that creature. It just doesn't say outright "use the movement of the creature." What it does say is that it can "cause damage by making the target believe the illusion's attacks are real, but it cannot otherwise directly affect the physical world."

From that, I'd assume grapples, trip attempts, shoves, and anything that causes or prevents movement are right out. However, while it explicitly calls out Strikes when saying they're nonlethal and deal 3d4 mental damage, when saying how it can cause damage it does not use the word "Strikes." As such, while I'm assuming any attack it uses is limited to the same damage, that it is not limited to melee "strikes." It should be able to use ranged attacks (restricted to the same 500 foot from caster limit still) to cause damage as well as melee attacks. Further, it calls out applying resistance and weaknesses, but them not affecting regeneration turned off by those - so I'd assume a flaming sword in an illusion paladin's hands can count as having dealt "some fire damage" and just apply the vulnerability or resistance from there.

It's still very unclear though for if, say, an illusion of a large dragon could do a breath weapon and attack everyone in the area, or force any saving throws. It has attack bonus based on your spell attack, an AC based on your save DC, and its own saves are based on your spell DC as well, but it doesn't mention having a Save DC of its own...
But that could be because it's assumed, being a spell of yours, that anything it could do that would have a DC obviously uses your spell DC. Personally, I'd allow any abilities that a creature has to be able to be used if they can be used with one or two actions (no reactions), but all damage dealt uses the illusion's damage, and no further effects of the attacks function. No knockback, no immobilization, nothing like that. And since the lack of an effect that should be there is inconsistent with the illusion, it would allow an immediate perception check to disbelieve for anything like that.

That said, it's also probably important to note that while it states a creature who "touches the image or uses the seek action to examine it" can attempt to disbelieve it, that the illusion's attacks do not carry this on them, or the mention of inconsistent damage giving a check wouldn't exist. Part of the balance of the illusion is that a creature has to expend an action to make the attempt to disbelieve or remove it generally. If an attack hits it, it already vanishes, same as if it fails a save, but if it attacks it doesn't give extra free saves constantly unless the attack's results are inconsistent with what the target expects to feel.

And if it is dispelled by being struck, creatures who took damage from it can not regain any of the lost (nonlethal) damage. But if they disbelieve it via an action (seek or as part of any action that would touch it without damage such as a grapple or trip allowing a perception check), then the illusion remains but that creature is immune to further damage from it, and regains half of what they lost to it.

No no, I do think tying trace to strikes is a good idea for RS.

Runesmith is a martial class with full martial profs, yet it's a class that has almost no reason to ever swing for a Strike. Meanwhile Guardian is crying in the corner with their lagging progression.

In another thread I suggested that all Trace change into 2A at base, and any successful Strike contributes 1A toward a Trace. That would go a long way toward balancing the class, but idk if it would be "enough" on its own.

Mm, 2A at base to trace while still needing invokes and without ways to reduce the action cost would pretty much kill the class's action economy. But half-traces with strikes on a given creature would have its own problems with having to track those half traces and their own durations.

If you went that route, you'd have to have the strikes build up actions towards tracing a rune that the player carries, and then expends for a free action trace on any target rather than the one that was struck. Or build one trace charge and then expend it on next successful strike to apply a rune to a target.

It's a similar issue to another of the ideas I had with being able to apply runes as phrases with separating out functions and spending one action per rune in the phrase: Unless you have runes having to be done all in a row without interruption, you litter the battlefield with incomplete runes that have no effect, but might still have durations to track and the ability to complete. If you have them on creatures, you have to mark them on the creatures, if you have them on objects, you have to know where the objects are and with what words. So I figured the only way that one would work is if "building a runic spell" didn't apply it anywhere until you had spent all the actions to fully make the spell and "end" it, then you place it in a completed form. And you couldn't pause one to work on another without the first one fading away due to not having been left in a stable state.

Maybe a ranged engraving strike, combined with a feat that you could take to count enemies off guard against you if they bear a rune, so that remote detonation or other follow-up attacks become more accurate. That would apply to engraving strike itself, too, of course. If you let Engraving strike actually work with two handed weapons and weapon + shield combos while avoiding reactive strikes as well as letting it work with ranged weapons, you could probably weaken the damaging runes just a little bit as well while keeping the damage competitive for martial focused runesmiths, and then include a few more powerful feats for caster style runesmiths to take to help out...

Hmm, rather than a ranged strike that applies a rune like Engraving strike then, maybe a simple improvement for ranged weapon runesmith would be changing remote detonation to function with a rune cast onto the arrow being automatically invoked to affect an enemy that's struck? Action to apply to arrow, flourish action to shoot arrow and have it auto invoke on struck target, with them having a -2 to their saving throw if it gets a critical hit maybe?

Though really, I feel like the class needs a lot of revision overall. As it is, it tries to be able to be built to do anything but isn't particularly good at anything outside of "enemy without reactive strike is at melee with you at the start of your turn, and is not immune to slashing, fire, or lightning damage.

I'd really like the support runes and debuff runes to be a little bit stronger, both on passive and invoke effects, maybe have traced runes last a bit longer since you already have a lot of restrictions on them (no more than one of the same rune's effect per creature per invoke, short range, verbal component that can be blocked, the initial actions to apply the runes...)

Well, that's the thing: it's P1E, not P2E... and it wasn't expanded as intended, since Ultimate Magic had to be trimmed down.

The Runesmith is the perfect class, with the perfect time to reintroduce that rule and properly make it viable.

Oh, I agree fully. It's just a completely different direction than they built the class so far for the playtest, so no matter how much I wish they'd go this route, I seriously doubt they will.

These invocations are honestly pretty terrible all around from what I've seen. Even with the option to apply traditions to runes that don't already have one, composite invocations are 2 action invocations, only can be done once per 10 minutes each, and generally have very minor effects.

Vital composite invocation? At level 6 you can restore 16 or 17 HP to a single ally target once per 10 minutes. So once an encounter at most. To do this, you have to first apply two runes on them which are a minimum of one action each if they're at touch range with you, or two actions each if not. You get this feat at the same level as you could pick tracing trance, so they can't be used together unless you delay taking one of them for level 8. And if you try to cast both runes at range... you don't have enough actions to trigger the invocation due to its 2 action activation requirement. At least 1 of the runes must be applied at touch range. So stride-trace-trace on an ally within 25 feet turn 1. Turn 2, Vital Composite invocation for 2 actions and you have 1 action left. For this you get to activate two invocations of non-damaging effects at once, and heal them by enough to counteract a single enemy strike at this level, approximately.

Clashing Composite Invocation? Level 10, competes with another 2 action invocation feat of all things (chain of words) and overload ammunition... so this is generally a level you take a lower level feat or a dedication feat for. Still once per 10 minutes, takes 2 actions to trigger, but is meant to target enemies. So... again, it can't be triggered the same round you apply the runes. Both of our main damage runes that are applied to an enemy creature instead of carried by an ally are primal, so you can't change them to clash. The best way to do this might be to make a diacritic rune such as Ur- or Sun- into an occult rune and pair with the primal fire / lightning rune. Now, if you didn't bother with the vital composite above, you can tracing trance to apply both at range, but you still need to use two actions on the next round to trigger a single damage burst, either with a +int damage or it reappearing to trigger again. So at best, if you use Sun- (which is also only once per 10 minutes), you can tracing trance to apply damage rune and Sun-. Then next round, if they haven't moved out of range despite the glowing runes on them (as you need invisible ink at level 2 to not be super obvious), you can spend two actions to invoke, and then your last action to invoke again for 2 damage runes. The equivalent of what you'd have gotten for a single invoke if you just traced both fire and lightning on the enemy previous turn at range. Or what you could do in a single turn at melee. In exchange for all that... sickened 1. Sickened 2 on a crit failure, but it's a fortitude save, same as nearly everything else you do so far. And if they succeed but don't critically succeed, sickened 1 but they can remove it with a single action. In the best case scenario, you're losing two actions to do this for no other benefit... so them succeeding their save might as well be them having used their one action to delete two of yours.

Astral Composite is another to target enemies with, inflicting stupefied, but it requires arcane and occult, so it can't pair with either direct damage rune. You're giving up 2 turns worth of damage with your runesmith for a save vs stupefied 1, 2, or 3 depending on save, fail, or crit fail. But hey, it's a will save! ...Which means that most enemies you'd want to actually target with this will make their saves easier than normal, as stupefied disrupts spell casting and is useless on most enemies with low will saves. At level 12, this one asks you to give up Distant Invocation or Expanded Glossary.

And the level 18 one honestly is the most egregious. You need 4 runes on the enemy to trigger it, only one of them can be the normal damage rune. You could use Inth- for divine and stack a bit of persistent damage through it, but you'll still be without particularly good options for the remaining two for occult and arcane runes you'd like to stick on an enemy if you do that. You could use a different diacritic to cover occult or arcane and then use Rovan, Seal of the Dead Vault for Divine, but all in all, it's hard to find 4 runes you want to trigger on one enemy at once currently. In order to put all 4 on, you need to be at melee and use tracing trance both, or split it over two rounds and still be at melee for it, or have triggered Drawn in Red or Define the Canvas prior. The only good thing I can say for Annihilating Composite Invocation is that it has no action cost listed. Not even a free action... meaning it's probably a typo, and we can assume that a DM would at least make you spend 1 action for a normal invoke, possibly two. ---After ALL that... the bonus you get is 10d4 extra damage with an extra fort save against it. An effect that is less than one a single extra whetstone rune would have given you at level 10, if they weren't resistant to slashing damage.

There's no way any of these can be good in the way they're currently designed. They're weak enough that they don't warrant the extra action cost or the 1 per 10 minute restriction on them, they're inconvenient enough to set up with the current rune list (even before remembering that we have a runes known limit) to be extremely hard to trigger even then. And you give up chances to take other, better feats for these, even if the better feats are at lower levels or through dedication feats.

The only remotely good feat that is related to these is Chain of Words, which invokes runes on two different rune-bearers, ally or enemy, and then does a small damage line between them that does scale to half of your normal damage runes. It's AOE, it's flexible, and it explicitly has a base range of 60 to invoke from instead of 30, meaning distant invocation boosts it to 90. You could theoretically make a 180 foot long line of 5d6 force damage with this at level 10 when you get it, or 10d6 at level 20. It's still low enough damage and high enough action and setup cost that it definitely doesn't warrant the 1 per 10 minute use restriction, but I can at least picture situations where I'd use it. But it's also not technically a composite invocation feat, just something that shares most of the attributes of them.

I'd like a "create a spell" mechanic.

Break down every single aspect of spells, such as...
* area of effect
* damage type
* damage amount
* damage die
* duration
* defense
* bonus/penalty to saves
* bonus/penalty to AC
* bonus/penalty to skills
* heightening
* component
* etc

... into "rune syllables", and let the Runesmith writes and speaks out custom words with those runes.

Of course, stronger runes/effects would require a higher level, the Runesmith would have a limit of runes per word that grows, all the good stuff.

HUGE endeavor, but HUGE payoff with what players could come up with :p

You're suggesting basing runes on the words of power alternate rules from Pf1e (like I suggested on another thread earlier). So we technically already do have a base to work from if we wanted to do that.

https://aonprd.com/Rules.aspx?ID=1016

Here's a link to some of the 1e ruleset.

Right, the ammo being destroyed thing is something I forget about since... arrows do not work that way in real life. At all. Like, even if it "breaks" the wooden shaft, the metal arrowhead is not being destroyed. It's a chunk of steel. Unless you shoot it into magma or something, it's going to stick around and keep the rune on it undamaged.

But, rules as written apparently sublimate steel if fired from a bow, so thrown weapons would be the alternative if a DM decides to go RAW.

Either way, the tendency for it to make a runesmith more greedy is definitely a potential issue, and dropping a missed arrow in an enemy space with whetstone rune to still hit them on an invoke doesn't work for fliers, so I guess it only loosely patches the problems for ranged combat as a runesmith.

Maybe adding an engraving strike equivalent for ammo for a single action trace and fire? But MAP would apply to using remote detonation same round still without any ways to mitigate it currently, so enemies keeping at range you'd be invoking every other round at best still. Might be worth it for a 120' range using short bow and far shot doubling your range increment. And Henge Gate turns it into something absurd at level 14... but that's a bit late for really good support to the play style.

I'm going to add onto the specific runes bit real quick:

A rune with ongoing damage that scales better than the thunder rune's passive DoT. The scaling on Ranshu's DoT is silly unless it's actually intended for using an etched rune being transposed before running and letting someone just fry for the entire day. Since traced runes only last until the end of the runesmith's next turn, and the damage is on the target creature's turn if they fail to move... in actual play it's "target takes a single instance of 1d4 (+1/odd level past 1) if they don't use any method to move on their turn. It's very little damage (6.5 average at level 10) for a delay on invoking it... that isn't even guaranteed unless a creature is grappled or otherwise immobilized. And it can't stack with itself, so no using tracing trance to apply 4 copies and seeing the enemy take 4d4+16 (26 average damage at level 10) before you invoke for the full burst. I'd like one that instead triggered every time a creature DID move, or one that caused retaliatory damage when they make a strike, even as a reaction. Things that encourage an enemy to do less on their turn or take more damage themselves.

A rune that inflicts vulnerability to element instead of reducing resistance alone with its passive effect. The passive effect of Atryl doesn't come up as often as it should, since if a creature isn't resistant to fire, it does nothing... and if it's immune to fire, it does nothing. The only thing it helps with is when a creature resists fire some. The amount is actually pretty fair, mostly ignoring any resistance you'll see at level 1, and ignoring 15 points of resistance at level 20 when most resistances that aren't immunity are 15-22. But if it was "add vulnerability" of "remove resistance", it would come up on all creatures that didn't have immunity. I wouldn't even mind if the initial value of 6 was reduced to 3 in that case, so that at level 20 it would be +12 damage for fire attacks on any creature with the rune on them.

More runes for buffing allies. Temp HP runes, runes that can be expended to give a re-rolled saving throw with the bearer's reaction... though those could fall under adaptable protections, I guess. Also, a rune that could be invoked to quicken an ally on their next turn with a passive of increasing move speed. Maybe a rune with a passive that grants +1 to attacks against off-guard enemies, and when invoked causes all enemies to count as off-guard against the bearer until the end of their next turn.

For something that could be a rune or other things:
Some option to extend durations of traced runes in combat outside of the etched runes: Maybe a Diacritic rune that causes a traced rune it connects to have its duration bumped up to a minute. Maybe a feat to change it for all runes you trace to last 1 minute or until invoked (possibly only when traced from a space prepared similar to define the canvas and henge gate.) Or maybe even just in general. See my earlier mention of the ongoing damage passive only having the ability to trigger a single time for any rune you trace, while etched runes end up with unlimited duration DoT cheese to kill anything not resistant to lightning. Maybe in exchange for having some ability to have traced runes last long enough to matter if you don't invoke them, we could have etched runes lose their passive effects when not within say... 200 feet of the runesmith to reduce cheese. I don't know.

Ways to let the runesmith be more interactive with the environment if you want to play them more as a mage than a magical martial:
The wards and stance options above are a good start on that. But say you can put runes on the ground that count whoever is standing in their space as the runebearer. An option to connect multiple runes to cause any creatures in the area of effect they outline all count as runebearers to all those runes. Things that allow prep time before a battle to let you make dangerous traps you can lure enemies into, or fortified positions for your party to fight from with strong advantages until the enemies close the distance.

Ranged runesmith is so significantly worse than the melee one, the 30-foot range on the 2 action Trace is just not a safe distance, at all, and is practically only good for making you not take Reactive Strike at a rather hefty cost, or tracing...

I'm curious - if you were using a ranged weapon, did you test out applying the damaging runes to arrows and shooting them as normal strikes? It's not explicitly called out either way, but since a creature in possession of an object with the rune on it becomes the rune bearer, and an arrow that hits a creature and deals damage is assumed to stick in them, any creature struck with an arrow that has a rune on it should have that rune "applied" to them, but able to be removed by pulling the arrow out with an interact option.

Tracing trance and melee range trace for two runes (any combo of the two available damage runes, since whetstone can apply to an arrowhead and the fire and lightning ones are "creature or object"), then two actions to try to shoot them. There aren't very many ranged weapon supporting feats, only like three, so there's a lot of room to take dedication archer in it. Then every other turn, trying to get a remote detonation, or using invoke (especially once taking the invoke range + 30 feat) along with prepping an arrow for next turn or giving an ally a rune that could help them out...

Plus having the initial etched runes you can have be on arrows for them sticking around once shot even if you don't detonate them instantly, and allies being able to shoot one or two off as well if you need them to.

Again, I know it's not called out explicitly as working this way, but I haven't seen any reason it shouldn't work. But even if a DM says no to that, whetstone runes should still be able to apply damage to targets adjacent to wherever the arrow is, and if it's hitting a creature and not "transferring," that creature should still be a target option for those. So I'm curious if it would improve things substantially, or just still be worse than a ranged fighter or ranger.

Okay, so some of the main issues so far are "enemies that are immune to fire / resist lightning," which are both pretty common, really hit damage output due to lack of damage type options. Weapon strikes can't keep up past a point due to just not scaling as well when there aren't dedicated feats to give stance bonuses or other actions that improve your strikes, like every other martial character has. And that half of the chassis you're given just ends up not being used due to being incompatible with other parts.

Most of the last problem, I previously addressed with some ideas for, such as just assuming that you don't need the free hand or take reactive strikes when using Engraving Strike/Fortifying Knock, though the issue of needing the free hand for outside of melee still exists with sword and board, so there's still a temptation to go weapon + free-hand or shield + free-hand.

Damage types really only has two good solutions - either we need runes for all damage types, or we need a rune that can swap damage types, chosen on tracing. I know some people lean more towards the second to avoid being able to stack up too many different types of damage runes to activate at once, but that could lose some of the flavor given to runes we have. "A rune placed on a stone to let it burn and keep a fire going all night" and "A rune that creates a lightning rod to protect you in a storm" are really cool flavor descriptions... all the more so if the DM lets them actually do those things outside of combat. But at the same time, imagine if you have a list of effect runes that you can then apply the elements to - "I substitute the part of this runic formation that means fire for cold, and now I have can have ice that won't melt even in the desert heat to keep my food cool. I substitute this lightning portion of the lightning rod rune for fire to protect the camp from stray embers catching anything near the rod on fire." Making the runesmith runes into complex runes that can be altered instead of a single rune allows keeping the flavor of things while still letting you alter it for your purposes.

Lastly, the weapon damage not scaling... we honestly need more feats that support play styles. We have maybe 3 for ranged combat total, we have a small handful for melee attacks but none to help you hit more accurately or do more damage (other than adding a trace to a hit), and we have a handful for more magically aligned runesmiths. If there was a feat so that "All runebearers count as off guard to attacks you make against them," that could instantly improve things a lot while avoiding any easily stacking bonuses. Having another for "you deal extra damage to rune bearers you strike with attacks" could also be a good option. Treat it as similar to sneak attack but slightly weaker, d4s instead of d6s for instance. Or could use the existing runic optimization for it but let it stack multiple times - "add the value of your Runic Optimization an extra time for every rune affecting the targets of your strikes." Maybe a reactive strike version of Engraving strike that could be taken as well for people who aren't using the shield.

I will say that, for making Runesmith actually function as a martial character rather than a caster, there are a few things that can be allowed to make it feel good. Mostly, they're changes that could be argued as being the intent of the existing rules though.

For melee:

Engraving strike and fortifying knock, assume they ignore the normal requirement of a free hand for tracing a rune, and remove the manipulate action for it. The feats themselves don't include a requirement of a free hand in them, after all, and don't have a manipulate keyword on them, while other feats like transpose etching do have Manipulate called out explicitly on them.

Again, I know that rules as written, an action compression feat should inherit those off of the trace rune action unless explicitly stated otherwise, but if you assume that the intent was to allow a sword and board or two-handed hammer fighter to use these, then it cleans up things pretty nicely. Being in melee with enemies who can take reaction strikes, you can still trace twice by raising your shield and attacking with engraving strike, and have a third action left to invoke if desired, all without taking reaction strikes.

Add in Runic Reprisal, and it comes together very well by level 6.

Even better would be if you made Engraving strike a 1 / turn free action with the activation condition of "you successfully strike a target" to get the trace. That would let you stack it on other melee feats from a dedication feat's extra options, including support for heavier hitting two-handed weapons replacing the shield... But that could be too good, potentially.

For Ranged:

If you assume that being shot by an arrow and having it hit you makes you the "rune bearer" for any runes that were applied to the arrow head, a runic archer build actually opens up. You still don't have anywhere near as many feats that support it as you have with sword and board, but that just means archer dedication is an easy option to add in. It's clear that there's intended to be some reason to go with a bow or crossbow, given that you have a 1st level feat to let you invoke at greater range with an arrow, and the fire and lightning damage runes do fit on objects -or- creatures and target the rune bearer. Plus the whetstone rune can go on piercing weapons, like arrows and bolts.

Melee application of a rune to slap it onto an arrow with only one action, good until the end of your next turn. Tracing Trance could allow you to prepare two and fire them both off, using double or triple shot feats off of archer dedication. Then next turn remote detonation to make them explode from significantly higher than 30 feet away. Short bow with far shot could give 120 feet or something for instance.

Overloaded Ammunition still isn't a great pick since it's only 2/day of a not super well scaling smaller fireball, but it's more proof that a ranged fighter runesmith was intended as an option, despite the lack of an equivalent of engraving strike for ranged weapons. All that is part of why I think the above ruling of an arrow sticking into someone letting you count them as a rune bearer could be rules as intended. Especially with distant invocation not coming with any ways to improve range to trace your runes as part of it. And Henge Gate then just becomes "set up with 2 actions to not need actions to apply runes to your ammo for a while" instead of making an entirely new mechanic for applying runes through ranged weapons at level 14.

From a lore perspective, I can definitely agree that runes should be something you learn and keep in a book. Hell, you already learn runes and store them in a book with the ones you craft on magic items. So what makes the ones you can trace and etch different? Being prepared would also free up a lot of easy variety by making weapon and armor / shield runes something you could just prepare as something traceable / etchable for temporary enchantments without giving up the more unique class runes.

Going into a fight where you know you'll want fire damage, for instance, and having one rune prepared slot swapped to "Flaming weapon rune" could instantly provide a huge amount of value. Or, you know, ghost touch. Any rune you'd almost never use in general play but which would be super useful situationally suddenly becomes something you can prepare for the day when you find out you're dealing with something specific.

I brought this up earlier in another topic, pretty sure. There was a pathfinder 1e teamwork feat for casters to add special effects by casting two elemental spells together using a held action.

https://aonprd.com/FeatDisplay.aspx?ItemName=Elemental%20Commixture

You had a primary spell and a secondary spell, where the secondary wouldn't have its normal effects, but instead modify the primary spell to have +1 DC, +1 CL vs SR, immunity to standard counterspelling, and a secondary effect based on the two element tags. Temporary blindness and nausea, save vs prone, movement speed reduction, catching fire, staggering and concentration checks to cast spells...

An ability to stack two simple damage spells and, instead of just upping damage, add secondary effects and boost the save DC by a bit, could be a very neat way to keep damage to reasonable levels while also adding a lot more tools to the kit for debuffs.

Mmm, I'm going to add my two cents here - I can definitely see a good reason to avoid large burst runes as a thing you just do on your turn for runesmith... but rather than get rid of it completely, I think it might be more interesting to make it harder to deal the damage just outright without thought, and instead make it so there's a lot more focus on set-up into pay-out.

Like, what if you couldn't apply runes onto enemies directly, or to their equipment? What if instead, you had to apply runes to objects (small rune stones, slips of paper, metal plates, an arrow or sling bullet,) unoccupied spaces on the ground, or equipment (ally armor and shields and weapons) and then could have triggering reactions that you could set off?

Set up a rune on a spot on the ground within 30 feet of you. An ally forces the enemy to move onto it, you can use your reaction to trigger the rune, or set it to auto-trigger on the first creature of at least medium size to enter its space, but then not be able to prevent an ally setting it off by accident if they get shoved into it first. Set a rune onto a weapon set to go off on striking an enemy, and you can then shoot it or smack someone to auto apply and invoke, but with an action to prepare it first. And maybe if you attach a rune to a weapon attack, the hit could substitute the save.

Then you could have more martial melee and ranged feats that gave bonuses when using weapons that have runes on them, as well as stuff to move runes on objects / the ground around, cause their passive effects to apply to a larger emanation around them rather than just their own square... Set up traps of two or three runes that are linked together so that if an enemy touches one, they can be hit by all three at once, making your area denial REALLY scary to ignore once you start setting up enough of it...

Honesty, I hate this ability so much. Just everything about it. Not able to make new runes until level 20, only one, and that one... doesn't fit any other runes.

Because you're copying an existing spell to create the rune, what's the passive effect going to be? Nothing. Nada. The invoke effect will just be the actual spell you're copying. But it's usable at will, since it's a rune, and auto up-cast to 10th level. That example of infinite combat speed heals? Yeah, make that significantly worse: It's an infinite use 10th level heal on a class that can only heal a small amount once per 10 minutes with a feat prior to this. But wait, there's more problems!

How does cast and invoke interact with spells that let you spend more actions on their casting for larger effects? Does it change the invoke speed? Does it count all the actions used to place it already? Does it only use the 1 action cast all the time, or the max 3 action cast effect? 10d8+80 in a 30-foot emanation at will with 2 actions by slapping yourself and invoking sounds a bit too strong for a class that otherwise is very clearly not meant to be a primary healer based on existing runes and feats, even at level 20. And it would be such a huge change to the character's feel if they suddenly are doing that all the time.

Oh, and then there's the actual fluff problems beyond the fact that the spell runes won't act like other runes: We can already have runes learned for crafting purposes without the limits of runes known. Runes shouldn't be "known" in the first place, they should be learned and prepared if they're on an Int based class that Learned them. I'd accept the current runes known limit for someone who got runes etched into their soul by godly forces as they grew in power, or something, but if you are learning stuff, there's no reason you shouldn't be able to switch things out and learn new ones.

And for this feat in particular? It tells us, supported by the counter spell feat, that any spell can be broken down into runes. So if you can do it once... why can't you ever do it again? There's no god of runes you're worshipping who's giving you it, the feat says you manage to translate it. What if you're an Elf and have 500 more years in you, and you did this after 20? How can you never do it again?

It all just makes no sense, lore or mechanics wise, to include this feat the way it is. It's horribly abusable, but not even what you want for the class, and it further cuts off the idea in people's head that you can make new runes by saying "that's a level 20 feat to do that though."

I really do like the runescribing weapons trait option as a way to make the martial runesmith a bit more iconic looking in addition to having their playstyle work with the current chassis. Though it's not quite the idea I had for what a rune smith should feel like (much less focused on the tracing runes on creatures in battle, much more on activating runic effects pre-prepared and using enhanced equipment for self and allies), it makes for a fairly good compromise without splitting the class and changing it more than the Devs might be looking to do so.

Though I still feel like the "blacksmithing weapons" pairing that they suggest are important for a runesmith with that one feat might also work as well for things.

Another way to play a runesmith type archetype might be taking inspiration from the snare crafting system already in place. Leaving rune stones on the battlefield that can then be activated for single target closest creature effects, or small or larger AOE effects, or even runes that could be invoked multiple times but have to be set up in a physical location and can't be moved after...

Though again, none of these really work with traditions on runes. The only real examples I can think of for runes having a tie to anything like spell traditions in media are generally "divine runes" being an angelic language... but when that happens those are generally the only runes. Or Draconic ones being the language of magic for a setting.

I think it kinda works in the opposite way. Runemisth probably uses a more ancient or "primordial" version of the runes most people use nowadays, who likely were made to be simpler than runesmith's runes but in contrast can be used or inscribed by anyone (or at least inscribed by anyone with Crafting).

However, I do agree with OP that having traditions for runes is not that meaningful honestly.

I would love words of power being used for lessons learned and an inspiration for runes.

I am curious what appeals to you about the fantasy of the Runesmith. Such information can help shape the Runesmith into a coherent design.

My own interest, aside from an interest in design in general, is that I like crafting in my roleplaying games.

I personally have a similar thing. I love crafting in my games, and I especially like the fantasy of the magic item crafter. The magic smith in particular is an old favorite that I've always loved. Though generally... that's more "Make weapons and enchant them, test the magic in combat, improve them" and less "wiggle fingers to make runes appear on enemies that blow them up." That feels more like runic mage to me than runesmith. Which brings me to the second thought I have below after the next quote...

The Runesmith appears to be a melee martial build with the additional magic of applying temporary runes. Since martials often use equipment runes, this seems like a natural pair up. If the runesmith primarily fights like a martial with Strikes, then it can be balanced like a martial. One-action Trace Runes that damage like Strikes would continue the balance, but they would have an unbalancing immunity to Multiple Attack Penalties. Two-actions Trace Runes at range could replace the runesmith picking up a bow against enemies that keep their distance, and could be balanced like spells, but Tracing Runes at range undermines the melee martial theme.

I don't see how spell traditions fit into this theme. Maybe I missed something.

I very much got a feeling that they basically crammed two different intended separate classes together for this playtest, more so than they normally do for magical martial hybrids. There're too many things that look way too different otherwise, plus the "need a free hand" "Should have shield with weapon" and "Bow is good too" stuff.

Runesmith and Rune mage - the class being separated into those and having more room to focus on a side of runic magic with their playstyle is something I'm thinking more and more would improve things here.

One that focuses on casting runes in combat and weaving them from afar as a mage, and then the other a magic item crafter who can make runes that are longer lived for special effects on equipment they and their party use, be it sword and shield or rune etched arrows.

I feel like they could have gone a completely different path with the runes, you know? The idea of "passive effect until active is triggered" is a fairly neat one, but runes are all about language and magic intersecting.

Like... if you had something like this:
"Rune of Resistance - when paired with a rune related to a damage type, grants resistance X to that type."
And "Rune of lingering - when paired with a rune related to a damage type, causes persistent damage of that type."
Maybe "Rune of Radiating - causes any paired runes to gain a 15' area of impact around them."

Something where, by combining "Radiate, Linger, Fire" you could create a sea of burning flames 15' in radius around an object or creature that you applied a rune to, where anything entering the area takes fire damage and instantly has to save against catching fire. Leave out radiate, and it only impacts the one with the rune (and anything that touches it since, on fire.) Leave out linger, and it just does a quick burst of fire damage.

Want to avoid damage stacking bursts? Sure, make it so that if you pair two different damage types, the damage counts as both types without doing more damage, or combines into new effect that still doesn't change the amount of damage. Maybe create steam from fire and water/ice runes to blind / conceal, for instance.

...Yes I'm aware the idea is very close to the Words of Power magic system in pathfinder 1e, along with the Elemental Commixture feat from the same. That just means they'd have a nice starting point to work from, just translating some of that into runes and 2e numbers.

To me if anything feels forced it's martial proficiency.

Like even if this was a caster I'd have fun with it.

I actually get a weird rune cleric vibe (cleric has a lot of gishy feats)

That's what I'm talking about. Martial proficiencies and martial related feats and abilities with armor proficiencies and bonus damage with magic weapons... all on a very clear solid "this is a mage" setup that uses magic rune effects you create with actions in battle to do a bunch of stuff, while needing a hand empty or holding artisan's tools to cast.

You know, the more I think about the proficiencies and the way that the class seems to be built, the more I wonder if the designers didn't try to cram two or three different incompatible classes into one. Maybe they wanted to make a whole "runic magic system" with classes to support it, but only got approval for a single class based on runes. It would certainly explain why the class identity feels a bit all over the place.

The entire Tracing setup needing a free hand, with options to W,FF runes out and use blood to spam magic on someone, or use their true name to screw up their saving throws after moving some runes off of one target to a new one... all of that feels like a runic mage. Especially with the multi-discipline rune invocation bonuses. A mage who should be in robes or lighter armor, standing back a bit further, balancing out spreading runes onto enemies and allies before detonating them for massive effects.

But then the shield block, medium armor, martial proficiencies, and "Hit with weapon to apply rune, shoot arrow to set off runes on target" options combined with the base features of getting extra damage through any weapons with rune based enchantments... feels more like the actual smith part of "Rune Smith." A magic item crafter who knows how to use and modify the tools they make, and when need be is more than willing to go out and deal with a problem personally. Probably while testing out the latest runic combinations they've figured out and doing some in the field troubleshooting. Etching as well feels more like it should fall under this part, rather than on the mage, for reasons we've very much seen in the damage calculations.

But neither idea is really fully fleshed out, and they're mashed together, but they're not mashed together really well. Only a few features really seem to blend them in ways that are both healthy and usable, while others bleed together in ways that lead to... well, shenanigans or seemingly unusable features.

You can still build the runesmith to lean into a specific class identity and role, but at least a few people have mentioned that if you're going for some of those, it might be better to archetype something that supports it and only take a small handful of actual Runesmith feats that you'd need.

Rune of conflict - passively prevents creature with the rune on it from being able to benefit from ally-only targeting effects, or provide such to allies. Does not flank, can't use an action to aid and give a bonus to someone else's checks... But gains a +1 to attacks and AC if they have no allies within 15 feet of them.

On invoking, creature makes a single strike against a creature in melee reach to them - if they fail a will save, the runesmith picks the target.

This one would be an interesting mix of buff and debuff that encourages the target to move away from their allies for a buff... but traced on an enemy, the effects end shortly with them out of position. If they stay close to allies to avoid being caught easily out where they could be ganged up on, you can force them to slap an ally. Or if you invoke the same turn you place it, save vs hitting an ally and causing some confusion and possible disruption of teamwork, especially with dumber enemies that can't easily understand that it was forced (beasts, low wisdom humanoids, creatures without any training in any magic tradition...)

An idea to add to the list - a rune of illusion applied to creatures that for the passive gives a stealth bonus, but when invoked allows a short duration of a blurring or invisibility effect (say, until end of the runesmith's next turn)?

Another rune that applies to objects that causes the terrain within ten feet of it to be difficult terrain, to everyone, even flying creatures who happen to pass through the air within ten feet of it. Maybe a wind rune that opposes movement through it. And then the invoke effect could be a knock-back to anyone in the difficult terrain that sends them ten feet in a direction of the Runesmith's choice on a failed fortitude save? This one having the added perk that it doesn't apply to a creature or armor, so the objects could be left at chokepoints to slow down an enemy advance through it. Or they could be applied to arrows and shot at spaces with enemies nearby to give them instant difficult terrain to deal with. Don't make the holder immune to the effect, and shooting the arrow into an enemy would be "movement halved until you take an action to yank the arrow out and walk away from it or toss it far enough away."

And... maybe a rune for drunkenness. Apply and passive clumsy 1, invoke for a reflex or will save (with the -1 from clumsy still) vs going prone?

Rune of Earth that gives a +2 bonus to saves and checks against being moved, tripped, grappled, or anything like that. On invoking, you can create a 15' tall, 30' long wall of stone torn out of the ground for instant cover.

To note, you can't set off four separate whetstone runes to harm the same creature in one turn. That would take four actions still. You can, however, get three off, which is still the 60d6 (3 basic fort saves) at level 20 to one or two enemies in one turn. You can also reach that 80d6 on a single target with two whetstone runes and then a Sun-Atryl (repeating fire) that you transpose onto the target your melee friend rushes (for one action.) Then two action detonations hits the 80d6.

...Yeah, this doesn't make it much of any less bad, when you're looking at single target burst being able to take out an important NPC or boss round 1 of a fight.

And those all also can bypass any "one rune per slot" limits that someone might implement since Sun-runes will give you two invokes on their own, and whetstones on different knives can still be carried by one person.

Was discussing some on how to fix that on the Runic Spam thread, and currently we have a couple of ideas I and MartialMasters are debating. Either limit invoking to once per turn (MartialMaster's preferred fix), or cause invoking to be a bit less precise based on an alternate reading of the invoke action's description - (Effectively, if you invoke a single whetstone rune, you'll invoke all of them in range, so any non-Sun- rune won't be able to be invoked back to back on a single target.)

One invoke per turn leaves maximum damage to 2 runes on a turn base if you use the slot limitations (so fire and thunder can't both go on the same target) or 3 runes if you leave the rune stacking as is. No difference between first turn and second here other than that a first turn 3-rune damage burst is only possible either with runes being allowed to stack (fire and thunder both transposed onto the target from ally) or with an ally taking an En-damage rune and eating the hit while carrying the whetstone rune, and using a traced or transposed rune to add onto the target before invoking.

The "all runes of the same name are set off at once" limits max damage on the first round of combat to a 3 runes of damage burst that will only work with using up the sun-rune etch and using transpose (or W,FF) on an enemy who you can be within range of at the start of your turn, or through the same methods as above with an En-rune on an ally or with double transposing etched runes if stacking is being allowed. Further turns will average lower, similar to above, but this option does allow a 3 rune burst turn one without an ally accepting self-damage, even if runes aren't allowed to have more than one in a single slot on a target.

I actually view your description of a problem, as good game design. You're having to seriously weigh your rune decisions and having to devote both actions and resources to both. You can do great damage OR save your friends, not both.

But multiple invokes to me seems more of a, for lack of a better term, wanting your cake and eat it too (always hated that but it's the best I got)

I was a bit more hoping for thoughts on the idea of alternatives I presented rather than "Sounds greedy. Extra restrictions on when you can use actions are good game design." I accept that there are times where restricting when something can be done is the right answer, but before deciding on that, exploring other options and seeing which seem to fit the desired outcome might be more helpful.

So, my first thought was that the wording of invoke mentions "you utter the name of one or more of your runes," and above the actual action's text, in "invoking runes" it again says "you can pronounce the true name of a rune you have applied..." So this could lead well to the idea that any identical runes are always set off together if they're in range. Your invoke range detonates any whetstone runes all at once if you detonate a single whetstone rune, for instance.

This completely removes the ability to spam a given rune multiple times in a turn outside of doubling up on a single rune via "Sun-" as a Diacritic. Combining this with "one slot, one rune" would mean that you shouldn't be able to have a single invoke have more than two runes deal damage to a single target without En- Diacritics at level 9, which can't have Sun- on them as well.

It also puts some of a nerf to W,FF as you can't spam invoke on several copies of En- Diacritic runes transposed by W,FF if they all go off at once with the damage unable to stack due to the "no duplicate rune effects in the same action" rule. W,FF is still strong with a Sun- rune combo, but is 1/day rather than per encounter, unlike most of the other problem items, but even that is less bad with this.

Thoughts? Further problems I haven't thought of? Other suggestions for possible fixes or changes?

The main thing I see as a problem with limiting invokes is that a lot of people will want runes with good emergency invoke effects etched on allies if they aren't trying to just damage burst the enemies turn one and sacrificing all defense to do so. But parties spread out a good bit if you give them room and a few turns with enemies in multiple directions - very few parties are actually good at sticking together and following the plan during combat.

The base invoke range of 30 feet is short enough that outside of small dungeon rooms, it's entirely likely that you might want to get an invoke off on two allies who are far enough away that you can't hit both of them with one invoke until level 12 with the 60 foot invocation range boost.

Maybe you have a homecoming rune on your wizard for if they get caught out of position, and an insulation rune on your fighter who loves charging the big dangerous stuff and the armies of minions alike, and the wizard's gotten themselves in a pickle where they'll be downed next turn after you in initiative, and the fighter's been grappled by an enemy who's decided they can get rid of the painful target by throwing them off a cliff next turn, and the fighter's attempt to escape already failed.

So you need to free your fighter from the grapple with invoking the insulation rune, which will also slap some extra damage on the grappler, and then move and teleport the wizard to behind you. You thus need to invoke, stride, and invoke.

That won't be possible with just the single invoke until level 12 if the two are more than 12 squares on an average map apart. Which, yes, is a fairly good distance, but my group regularly has a mix of more open, large maps with smaller more confined indoors ones, and I've very much seen someone run 100 feet away from the party to try to kill an enemy mage or something.

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Part of what I'm trying to do is keep in mind the non damage options that the runesmith wants to have, and how they'd be impacted by the attempts to balance out the blasting potential down.

What's the main issue with more than one invoke in a round if you assume the limitation of no duplication runes / rune slots? I'd assume it would be with having two to three allies all having Esvadir etched on their weapons and come in after you traced some runes the previous round, then detonating each Esvadir rune on a different action to stack them all together? Maybe with a body tattooed sun-Atryl with WFF to let you invoke it twice as well despite the limit of 1 rune per slot per creature?

...Okay, 10d6 per rank on round 2 in a small AOE from one person is still pretty concerning if the party had any way to get enemies to cluster or get to the healers/mages of an enemy formation. Even if it takes coordination and bunching up the party to be similarly clustered for AOE retaliations.

But I still feel the solution isn't going to be restricting invoke to once per round. Maybe it actually should be "all copies of the spoken rune (that you created) in invoke range are triggered?" That encourages diversification of what runes you're etching before going into the fight, or waiting for just the right moment and spreading the burst out a lot more to a wider area but lower damage surprise for the enemies.

And it would give remote detonation a very strong niche for setting off runes more selectively in addition to being able to set them off at a greater range when used.

-And- it could possibly be another good reason to use some of the diacritic runes. If "Sun-Zohk" doesn't get set off at the same time as "Zohk" and "Zohk" isn't set off by you invoking "Sun-Zohk," for instance, then though the option to do both at once is still there on the standard invoke option, Diacritic runes could be used to further control activations on etched runes and the like. It would even give "Ur-" a purpose if "Ur-Esvadir" doesn't have to be invoked at the same time as another "Esvadir" rune... but all of that at the cost of extra Etched Rune slots out of your very limited number of those.

I think the d6s are fine still, as long as you get rid of the ability to do the highest bursts.

Limiting things to fort saves already helps on not overwhelming the most durable enemies, so if we were changing to d4s, I might want to have more save options with other damage types. And/or d6 for commonly resisted elements like fire, d4 for more uncommon damage types and alternate saves types, like spirit damage on a will save.

The big thing is either limiting how many of the damaging runes you can use in the first place at a time or limiting the number of times you can invoke runes on a turn. One or the other, but maybe not both.

I personally prefer being able to invoke more often but not being able to stack things up as high without more creativity, though. Along with the future proofing from the "one rune per slot" rule. The short range on invokes, especially in the first half of the level progression means there could easily be times when you'd want to invoke, stride, and invoke on another rune a different ally has on them. Especially for things like homecoming runes to pull back people out of sticky situations.

Or homecoming invoke, then invoke an AOE damaging rune now that the ally isn't in the area of effect. Or invoke whetstone rune on the fighter who charged in, then invoke homecoming when you see an enemy you expected to be dead saved for half and the damage rolled low.

I just don't want to remove options that can be used creatively if there are other ways to limit the more problematic elements.

"Though runes aren't spells, some things that affect spells also affect runes. Abilities that restrict you from casting spells or protect against spells also apply to tracing or invoking runes, though you can continue to benefit from a rune's effects."

To me, if abilities that restrict you from casting spells affect your ability to trace and invoke runes, than additions to allow a mute spell caster to still use verbal spells would apply for invoking runes. It could be spelled out better, but that allowance and any good DM should be enough to let you work with a mute runesmith.

Personally, I think we're going to see a change in the current wording of invoke rune. If they make it so you can only choose which runes to invoke by name, and all copies of that rune in range invoke automatically, then combined with the "multiple copies of a specific rune only affect a creature once" rule, we get rid of some of the multiple invokes in the same round cheese.

You would still be able to stack an Atryl, Ranshu, and Esvadsir going off at once to hit one enemy for 6d6/rank damage, of course, but without Sun- attached to one, that's it. That's the burst. There's no second action to trigger a second Esvadsir that was pre-engraved or a second Atryl that's waiting to be detonated.

Making invoke affect all copies of a given rune in range could cause issues of course with setting off Esvadsir from an ally not at melee with enemies yet, so maybe they'd allow you to pick "All copies of the given rune on any number of targets you choose," instead, but it would still help reduce spam.

There's also the option of limiting runes to one weapon rune per weapon, one creature rune per creature, etc, which would make it so changing the wording of invoke isn't needed. But I suspect given invoke reads as "you utter the name of one or more of your runes within 30 feet," that it was intended to be a little less precise than what the wording of "you can invoke any number of runes with a single invoke rune action" is currently being taken as meaning.

I'm going to say that the general idea of restricting runes to one per 'slot' (one weapon rune per weapon, one body/creature rune per creature, one object rune per object) really does sound like a good idea. Not just to reduce issues of stacking multiples of the same rune to then detonate multiple times in a round, or stacking lightning and fire runes on one person to detonate both... but as future proofing.

One of the big things I'm wanting to see later is more runes that have good solid buff and debuff options, as well as some more out of combat and less direct options. But if you have 5 different weapon runes that all add small passive boosts to attacking, and all have a different effect that's useful "when in melee with enemies," things could spiral out of control just as badly there as with stacking multiple etched whetstone runes or fire runes and lightning runes for damage bursts turn one.

Making sure each weapon only can have one rune means that the devs an feel more free to make the passive and active effects of those runes stronger, since there's no worry about them stacking together to make something game breaking. Same with further defensive shield and armor runes, same with offensive creature/object runes...

Plus, even if there end up being 6-8 elemental damage / physical damage runes to target creatures with instead of 2, if you can only apply one at a time per creature/object, there's less pressure to take all of your rune selections on more damage runes. Then you could make that class feat for changing out the element of weapon runes that already exists also apply to "runes you create are able to pick any of the above energy types when you initially trace or etch them," and you don't even have to worry about making a generic "elemental damage rune" - you could keep flavor for each one, let the player pick their favorite passive effect(s), take the class feat that lets them change the damage type of it, and have one or two of their limited rune choices cover enemy resistances and vulnerabilities fairly well with room for other types of runes.

How is remote detonation better compression? Both give a strike plus one other contingent action you’d be doing (without a chance of failure) anyway.

I think they're saying that due to not having to move to be in range to invoke the runes, meaning it's, if the enemy moved away, as good as a stride, strike, and invoke all at once.

I don't think henge gate works with diacritics; that'd be two runes, not one, and diacritics can never be applied by themselves. It's the same logic that makes a diacritic eat an etch slot.

From the playtest: "A diacritic is a special type of rune that is not applied directly to a creature or object, but rather to another rune itself, modifying or empowering that base rune." The Henge gate has the rune of your choice carved on their surfaces however, and I was referring to applying a diacritic to the gate's rune with your last action after the 2 to make the gate.

I could see arguments either way, from the player that they're modifying the rune on the gate, from the DM that there are technically two standing pillars that form the gate, so they'd have to at least cast it twice, once for each pillar. But I see no reason they couldn't be applied onto the gate at all. It would be applied to the rune that you put on the gate initially.

If the DM rules that you have to apply it to both pillars, Sun- can't be applied onto whatever you're putting there, but En- still could for instance. Even so, the gate is STRONG without the Diacritics, probably insane if Sun- is allowed to work on it, and if Aiuen isn't fixed, then it's a save or lose machine gun.

As for giving Aiune a cooldown for its invoke, that could interfere with its base use of teleporting allies around, and if you tie it only to the "on enemies" effect, I can't really make that make much sense lore wise for why it has a cooldown. I'd rather just make it so that unwilling creatures need to crit fail their save to be sent out of line of sight and have a minor "on save" effect of something like clumsy 1, and on fail can teleport them adjacent to any rune in line of sight while leaving them clumsy 2. Makes it useful still while making the save or lose a crit fail effect at least. That or just make the crit fail still line of sight next to another rune, but leave them stunned or clumsy for a longer duration... something like that.

I've seen plenty of discussion about the lower level problems, from the outrageous damage spike potential the class has in the right situations, to the issues with using the class for options that seem intended but then rules might not allow without three hands or very specific and limiting gear choices...

But I haven't seen a few of the higher level options that I feel are problematic brought up yet, so I'll make a thread for those.

The biggest ones I've noticed are the level 14 Henge Gate, the level 17 Rune for Aiuen (Elf gate key teleport rune), and the level 20 Forge New Word.

Now, the level 20 one is a level 20 feature, so... I don't really care as much about how broken something has the potential to be at level 20. But level 14 abilities are a lot more likely to come up for a long stretch of higher level campaigns, and level 17 has the potential to be present for what should be the climax of the most epic campaigns and adventure paths you'll play. Having powerful abilities that feel good are important, but having a single option that overshadows everything can definitely be a problem, turning every problem into a nail.

So, Henge gate first: You create a pair of pillars with a rune engraved that any ranged physical attacks sent through have the rune engraved to the ammo. Then auto-transferred on hit. This is not just for the runesmith, but for all allies as well. Meaning, at the most simple when you get it, the party can set up to rain arrows down on a group of enemies, stacking multiple copies of the same rune on targets, and you can spend your turn detonating three times... every round potentially. Especially if any difficult terrain or other control abilities are used to stop enemies from charging through. Good, but not too powerful... until you realize you can apply diacritic runes to the rune on the gate. Now three hits on enemies between two allies shooting three allows for three AOE bursts of 2d6/rank damage on your turn. Or persistent unholy fire damage on top of the direct damage. Or since you only made one Sun- diacritic Rune, but it's being copied by the gate...
This has some potential to get really powerful, I feel, and overshadows the other two level 14 options. But it gets worse at level 17.

So the Aiuen rune can let you teleport anyone who gets within 30 feet of you. 2 actions to apply, 1 to force a will save. Every round, no cost other than actions and thus opportunity cost. It can also be used on the party to let you pull the entire party out of a bad situation to base camp as a single action with etched runes, but the main problem is this is a save-or-lose that you can use every round from the start. You can teleport a target to ANY RUNE you have, including sigils from the cantrip you can take at level 1. By level 17, the duration of Sigil is permanent, and you are not limited to how many you can have. So you can have one on the other side of the planet on holy ground with sunlight all around. Another right above a volcano's bubbling heart. Another on an anchor dropped to the bottom of the ocean. Another launched into space by a party wizard, or sent to the moon. Anywhere you can get a small object to, on the same plane of existence, you can now send enemies to if they fail a single will save.

Vampire? To holy ground in the sun light in a running stream of water with paladins nearby on the other side of the planet. Fire dragon? Bottom of the ocean. Ice dragon? Into the magma of a volcano. Anything that needs to breathe? Outer space. Make a hollowed out prison a mile underground and you can leave a sigil in it to teleport enemies into a timeout box.

So that's awful, since save-or-lose is generally a terrible option, especially without any resource cost. But now combine them.

That's right, one action to force a will save to every enemy struck with arrows last turn vs being teleported to the moon, or to the bottom of the ocean under 15,750 psi of pressure. Then a second action to do it again to ones that made their first save but got hit twice. Have a single boss? The whole party gets at least three hits on him? Three will saves vs your boss being gone. Unless every major enemy puts some way of blocking teleports up, they will face a bunch of save-or-dies. And at the same time, most people able to block teleports could use it and might want an emergency escape spell ready. Such a shame that leaving teleportation open leaves them vulnerable to being sent into a volcano.

If it was limited to teleporting on the battle field, or evacuating allies out of battle to a base camp, or letting the party instantly move between cities to cut down travel, sure. That would be great. But being able to target enemies at all with this feels dangerously likely to become one of those "that one trick that DMs hate" while also leaving the party bored after the first or second time you use it to trivialize a fight.

Maybe have it so that teleporting outside of line of sight only works on willing targets? Unwilling targets can be teleported if they fail a will save, but only to locations you can still see and have a rune or sigil near? You can still set up a trap, drop a sigil in it, and then throw enemies into a kill box, but it's not the save-or-lose that teleporting them all to the bottom of the ocean or something is.

I feel like it could also be clarified for if damaging runes placed on an arrow can already be triggered to harm a struck creature. Because I don't know about you, but I think if a metal arrow head suddenly explodes into fire or is struck with powerful lightning while it's inside of someone's body, that's going to deal damage to the body it's stuck in.

In which case, preparing arrows (melee touch rune trace, 1 action each) and then shooting them and detonating the fired arrows (both the runesmith and allied archers able to shoot them possibly to spread them out) sounds like a pretty solid play style option. Especially with remote detonation there to let you set off all runes on a target with a ranged attack when it gets out of your base invoke range (in the first range increment so you're not sniping with this from too far.)

Even if the fire and lightning runes somehow wouldn't work, wouldn't the whetstone rune work then? It applies to objects and has some AOE, as would any runes with the En- Diacritic rune added. Even if you just shoot the arrow adjacent to enemies, you can then trigger it - and hitting a 5' square is significantly easier than hitting the AC of some monsters. Though remote detonation might call for a trick shot to shoot your own arrow or something if the arrow was more than 30 or 60 feet away.