Sandal Fury's page

I'm putting together a new character, level 10 orc fighter. I envision a fairly standard samurai, two-handing a single katana, extension of the soul, peerless swordsmanship, yada yada. I've only played a monk in 2e so far, but looking over feats/archetypes/items, it seems like there are VERY few enticing options for two-handed characters in this edition. I get that in Starfinder and 2e, Paizo wanted to rein in two-handers, and understandably so; I found that in 1E, if you had a two-handed weapon and Power Attack, your character was essentially at their peak, and every item and feat you gained from then on was just icing on the cake, and it sometimes felt like AP writers sometimes forgot how much damage those weapons could deal.

It seems like in 2e, if you're either weapon-and-shield or "duelist" (one-handed weapon, off-hand empty), you're practically *drowning* in cool options to add to your repertoire. Meanwhile, two-handers get slightly better damage dice and seemingly nothing else. I'd love for my new character to masterfully deflect enemy blows in classic samurai style, but try as I might, there seems to be no support for any such thing. Anything approximating fancy swordplay requires an empty off-hand.

But I'm still pretty new to 2e, maybe I'm wrong! Are there any feats/archetypes that I'm glossing over that would help me be something other than guy-who-enrtirely-sacrifices-defense-and-versatility-for-d10-damage?

I'm running Carrion Crown and just had a new player join. His character is a sort of steampunk-ish ghostbuster, reflavoring some of his spells as home-made gizmos and gadgets. My knowledge of the game isn't quite as all-encompassingly encyclopedic as it once was, so what are some on-theme spells and items for this character?

My group started our first 2E game a couple months ago. All but one of us are 1E vets, with myself having played from the very start all those many years ago. We're currently level 4, and I've noticed some patterns.

Enemies almost never miss.
Enemies deal considerable damage.
Enemies almost never fail saves.
Enemies NEVER critically fail saves.
PCs hit maybe half the time.

I've been playing a cleric, recently switched to monk (same character, we just needed another combat-type since our fighter had to drop out) with the Medic dedication. With 18 dex and +1 striking handwraps, I'm looking at a +11 on my highest attack, which routinely has less than a 50% chance to hit. Anything.

In going from cleric to monk, my AC jumped from 16 to 22. "Great!" I thought. But I was wrong. It was not great. My first time in melee, with 42 HP, I got knocked out in two rounds (one hit, one crit). Which is very not great when you're the medic.

After every battle, the party has taken *significant* damage. Someone goes unconscious every other fight. Which means numerous Medicine rolls (and previously, heal spells). I knew I was signing up to be a healer, but this has gotten to be pretty tedious. I've played less deadly games of Call of Cthulhu (with a particularly merciless GM). Not totally sure how to word this, but my assumption is that Paizo wanted to foster a sense of investment by making enemy attacks more dangerous: Players will feel more engaged if their HP is constantly fluctuating. In practice, this just means more bookkeeping, and more time KO'd (and therefore, not playing the game. Or having fun).

From reading the forums for a while before actually playing, I got this idea that in 2E, you pretty much have to minmax to have a 50% chance of success at the things you're supposed to be good at. From experience, it seems even worse. In 1E, I could make a combat-focused character with no ability score higher than 14 and make it work well enough. In 2E, that seems like it would be a recipe for disaster.

So I'm just wondering, is this normal? Does the game ever reach a point where you have a decent chance of avoiding damage? Or even a decent chance of *success?* I see people saying 2e lets you play whatever character you want, but it seems like that comes with the caveat that that character must be borderline minmaxed, which is not something I enjoy.

According to every source I've seen, one day on Vesk-3 is 28 hours long, and a year is, yup, you guessed it, six days. 168 hours. One Earth week. I'm not an astronomer, but I'm pretty sure that's too fast for a habitable planet.

We just finished book 1 of Giantslayer, which introduces a VERY nice suit of half-plate. Trouble is, no one in our party is proficient with heavy armor. So I got the idea to hold onto it with the hope of turning it into something my animal companion could wear (I'm a hunter with a horse, which I'll switch out for a gorthek at level 7). So, is there a by-the-book means of changing humanoid armor into quadruped barding?

Would it be legal for a creature (specifically in this case a Pakalchi sahkil) to combine its melee and ranged natural attacks?

For instance, 2 claws, 4 vines, 5-foot step back, 4 thorns. Can she do that, or is there an obscure rule somewhere that she has to decide to use only melee or ranged at the beginning of her full attack?

*EDIT* scrap that, scroll a little further down:

"A pakalchi can fling a volley of poisonous thorns as a standard action (make an attack roll for each thorn). This attack has a range of 100 feet with no range increment."

Standard action, not part of a full attack.

How exactly does this work? Is the dispel check made when someone first enters the hallowed area? Or does it happen every round as long as they remain within? Does it target items, or only active spells? Is there an automatic attempt to counterspell against every spell cast in the area?

SO VAGUE

Long story short, one of my old characters is now a minor god. And what's a god without a Divine Fighting Technique? So I threw this together, trying to keep it somewhat in line with other divine fighting technique feats (though I'm pretty sure it's a bit better in that regard; the initial benefit basically gives you the benefit of three feats).

Equilibirum

Initial Benefit: You gain the benefits of Two-Weapon Fighting and Double Slice, though only with two-bladed swords, and you may use your spellcasting ability modifier, instead of your strength modifier, to modify any attacks you make with a two-bladed sword. Additonally, you can wield a two bladed sword as a one-handed weapon. At the start of your turn, you decide whether you are going to wield the sword as a one-handed or two-handed weapon. When you wield it as a one-handed weapon, your other hand is free, and you cannot use the sword as a double weapon.
For the purposes of qualifying for feats that have Two-Weapon Fighting as a prerequisite, you may use your caster level in place of your base attack bonus, and your spellcasting ability score in place of your dexterity score; however, until you meet the actual prerequisites of these feats, you only gain their benefits in conjunction with two-bladed swords.

Advanced Prerequisites: Improved Two-Weapon Fighting, Weapon Focus (two-bladed sword), caster level 10th

Advanced Benefit: You can now apply your spellcasting ability modifier to damage rolls with two-bladed swords. As a swift action, you may expend a spell slot or prepared spell to treat your caster level as your base attack bonus for a number of rounds equal to double the level of the spell expended, though only when attacking with a two-bladed sword. Whenever you use a spell or ability that adds a temporary enhancement bonus or special ability to a weapon (such as greater magic weapon, and inquisitor's bane ability, or a warpriest's sacred weapon ability), you may apply the benefits to both ends of a two-bladed sword simultaneously. However, the effect expires twice as quickly, as appropriate for that spell or ability. For instance, the duration of greater magic weapon would become 30 minutes/level, a warpriest would expend two rounds' worth of his sacred weapon ability per round, etc.

Looking for any critique or suggestions. The last part of the advanced benefit might be a bit vaguely worded, but pretty much anytime someone would use this feat, I would be the GM, so I could easily shut down any attempted rules lawyering originating from my poor wording.

inb4 joke about "balance" and "equilibrium."

Alright, I don't really know how to format stuff on this site, so, here's a copy-paste of the second boon for Sentinels of Gorum.

Two-Handed Smash (Ex) If you make a full attack while wielding a two-handed melee weapon, you may make a single unarmed strike in addition to your normal attacks. In essence, after you complete your two-handed weapon attacks, you smash with your elbow, kick out with a foot, or make some other unarmed strike against an opponent. This bonus attack is made at your highest base attack bonus, and provokes an attack of opportunity if you lack the Improved Unarmed Strike feat or a similar ability. If you’re Medium, you deal 1d6 points of damage with this unarmed strike; if you’re Small, you deal 1d4 points of damage. Add half your Strength bonus to the damage dealt. The attack roll for the unarmed strike is subject to the normal penalties for two-weapon fighting unless you have the feats to reduce these penalties.

Is it just me, or is that the single worst ability in the entire game (outside of maybe Elephant Stomp)? Like, yeah, an extra attack on a full attack is pretty nice... but it provokes an AoO? And "normal penalties for two-weapon fighting" implies to me that the attack takes at least a -6 penalty, more likely a -10. Of course, you can take feats that mitigate this, but if you're any kind of normal beatstick, why would you ever take Improved Unarmed Strike or Two-Weapon fighting? That's like Spell Focus on a fighter. Has this been addressed or erratta'd?

In the next couple of months, me and some friends will be starting up Rise of the Runelords. Between five of us, we've got what I think is a pretty solid party: void wizard (myself, having not played a caster in a fair while), ax/shield unbreakable fighter taking the Deathless line of feats, investigator to handle everything a rogue would be good for, a bolt ace, and a cleric of Sarenrae going for the dervish fighting style (the player's kind of new and isn't really aware of how stupid powerful clerics become; he kind of just thinks they're healers). Seems like a solid five-man group to me.

Those are only the "mainstay" players, the ones who show up every week. The ones who I -know- have experience with/excitement for the game. The ones who spend time reading the rules and learning what their characters are capable of. The game is something of a church youth group event (I'm the only player above the age of 20), and is being DM'd by the youth minister (and he's damn good).

Enter: the conflict.

Counting the number of people who have shown interest in playing, any given session could involve up to thirteen players.

Thirteen. F***ing thirteen. Possibly more.

This group recently ran (read: blundered through) Shackled City, where we averaged about 8 people per session. It was chaos. Characters dropping in and out with no justifiable reason between weeks. Inter-party violence leading to numerous deaths. Children lacking attention spans (while fighting Drakthar in his wolf form, and with the party having firmly established that he was a vampire, one of the players was informed it was his turn; he looked up from his phone and asked, "are we still fighting that werewolf?"). It ended in an exasperating-yet-liberating near-TPK in the Kopru Ruins, after which we decided it was time for a fresh start. And since then, we've picked up three more players (brothers, the youngest of which is, I believe, 12), all of which are about as AD/HD chaotic neutral as you can imagine (I've played Call of Cthulhu with them, and their antics have very nearly ruined all of Lovecraft for me).

So this is my dilemma. As a sponsor in the youth group, I want the kids to come out and have a good time. As an invested gamer, I want to fashion a whip from leather cords and drive them out of the temple... so to speak. I doubt RotR can handle a fluctuating party of this size. I doubt any AP can. Assuming exclusion isn't an option, does anyone have any pointers on how to run/play a game with so huge a group? My fear is that in attempting to accommodate everyone, the game will devolve into a chaotic mess again and in the end, no one will enjoy themselves.

HALP

Apologies for the frequent parentheses and semicolons.

My party recently had a run-in with a particularly nasty glabrezu who managed to teleport away before we could kill him... twice. We know his name, and I plan to take him down by summoning him via Greater Planar Binding. I know to cast Magic Circle with a diagram and cast Dimensional Anchor to keep him from running again (the coward). My question is this: the description for Magic Circle states that if you prepare the circle with a diagram, "none of [the target's] attacks or abilities can cross the diagram." Does this really mean that none of his spell-like abilities can affect anyone outside the Magic Circle, essentially rendering him completely helpless while some archers fill him with arrows? If so, this seems like the go-to strategy for rooting out those pesky evil outsiders.