kind of a boring answer but... pistols? There are like three martial 1h ranged weapons in player core that doesn't feel like nearly enough.

Yeah vortex is pretty decent, especially if you can throw yourself into a group with it. Sometimes it can feel a little bit slow, especially if you end up rolling bad on initiative, and it's a bit of a drag in highly mobile fights where sustaining it eats into your normal actions.

I've also seen some quibbles over how much damage it actually does baseline and what its default duration is you might want to square with your GM, but nothing dealbreaking.

I've GM'd for a couple, most of my commentary is reporting back their play, which has generally been pretty poor. In our current game we're mostly propping the Solarian up by being sure to feed him lots of reactive strikes.

And like- ... idk consistently putting out super high damage just isn't a thing, the numbers aren't very high. The numbers are right there.

When they weren't geting reliable reactive strikes, the only person the Solarian was reliably outdamaging was the Envoy.

That is probably the best comparison point, but while the exemplar gets powerful transcend effects and multiple utility options through starting ikons the Solarian gets... a free throwing weapon.

Genuinely might be the weakest class in the whole system it's profoundly bad.

I think that "for people who haven't played PF2" is doing a lot of heavy lifting here.

The Solarian stands out for being literally the only class that in SF Core that does melee without jumping through hoops. Mystics and Witchwarpers are caster first, Operative and Soldier have to buy melee capabilities with a subclass, which potentially shuts you out of other options, and Envoys don't even really have that.

But in terms of overall efficacy the Solarian feels somewhat lacking and, again, mostly propped up by the fact that there are minimal alternatives within SF Core.

... I'm also not sure it really works as a tutorial either. The Solarian is a fiddly class with a lot of internal trap mechanics and relatively low throughput that encourages you to try to maximize its odds and ends as much as you can. If you get stuck in the wrong attunement, you have to spend an action or lose important bonuses. The Graviton strike feature can be very handy in certain circumstances and almost useless in others. You have to make sure your build has room to keep Solar Flare up to date or write it off as a class feature, which isn't really a consideration the other classes are expected to make.

Anecdotally, the new player experience I've had with people bringing Solarians to me has largely been trying to go 'all in' on damage and then realizing that damage kind of sucks (1d8/10+5 when a barbarian is doing d12+8 or a fighter d12+4 with +2 to hit is not a great feel*) and missing with solar flare because their dex is somewhat degraded** (in the playtest step 3 was to go supernova which generally had favorable reviews at least). Then I get asked if there are any good melee classes.

.. The frustrating part is that all of this was common criticism in the playtest, and Paizo's solution was to replace Nimbus with Reactive Strike, add that d10 option, and turn Supernova into a level 4 feat.

Reactive Strike is undeniably good, but very GM dependent and doesn't address much of the core criticisms people had.

The d10 feature on the other hand is kind of abysmal. d8/1h + two traits is slightly better than a default martial weapon, but d10 two-hand with no traits is a huge downgrade from the martial baseline. The Doshko is a die size higher and gets parry. TBH, giving up a free hand and all your weapon traits for one die size feels like another sort of trap that can easily make you worse when you think you're making yourself stronger... I also can't help but side eye the other weapon customizer: The Inventor can give themselves a d12 weapon and then add more traits onto it.

The loss of Revelations and Nimbus (okay Nimbus sucked but still it leaves me wondering why there was so much 'take' when the playtest solarian was already bad) sort of add to a feeling of degraded identity and power too. I realize there were problems with the arrangement setup, but it gave some baseline direction and a unique ability in the foundational kit. Without that the class really just is a guy who hits things, and isn't even particularly good at that.

It's really in a rough state.

*I say this not to suggest that the two were playing in parallel or to treat them as the same but just to look at the baseline power levels and emphasize how weirdly behind the curve the Solarian is even right out the gate. They're particularly well equipped otherwise to compensate either. The damage is so much lower you'd expect them to have some significant extra bit like an Exemplar, but it just doesn't.

**I realize this is true of any Str based martial looking to use a ranged backup, but it feels especially impactful on a Solarian because Flare is a core class feature and because their basekit is otherwise so anemic, not to mention having a ranged backup feels more contextually important.

Paizo needs to nerf Imaginary Weapon. 2d8 damage (at Rank 1) is as good as most Rank 2 spells. Even being a spell attack roll, it is just too good.

To put it another way, that's 1.5 more damage on average than Needle Darts, a cantrip anyone can pick up that has a 60 foot range... y'know as opposed to a melee range ability unique to a spellcaster that gives up slots for better cantrips.

It should probably be dropped down to 2d6 with +d6 per rank (regular and amped).

That's just gouging claw, a regular ass normal cantrip.

edit: My mistake, I forgot Gouging Claw bleeds on a hit and not just as a crit rider. So the idea is to make it worse, not the same as.

I don't think nerfing Imaginary Weapon would be the end of the world, but I also feel obligated to categorically reject this idea that the cantrip being all of one die size better than a default melee cantrip is somehow breaking anything

Despite some aesthetic similarities you're not really similar to a kineticist at all, or even other utility martials like the Inventor or Thaumaturge. You have basically no tricks base kit, but you might pick up a few via feats. More similar to a ranger maybe in that regard.

You're there primarily to Strike. Your baseline class features are two unique weapons with strike riders and a reaction to give you another Strike. There is literally nothing but hitting things with your weapon until you dig into specific feats.

I don't think you're missing anything, and tbh it does feel a little like it's missing some kind of baseline Solarianness with arrangements removed.

The class is very Strike centric, but not particularly exceptional at them. Its unique weapon is good but not super crazy, the damage buff is a bit weak and conditional, and that's your whole kit.

I mean, it's shifted focused since SF1 but the SF2 Operative has been the way it is for like over a year at this point, so it's not really something new or weird.

Not sure I agree it's half done either. I mean it has a few pain points I wish were better, but so does every class and Operative I think gets off better than most.

I want to play a soldier with a big shield but damoritosh's grip is a level 18 feat and there's only one 1h weapon with area (and it's an advanced weapon), zero with automatic, at least per aonsrd.

Would love a baby version of the feat available at lower levels or some more variety for 1h automatic/area weapons.

... To be honest, more 1h options in general? It's wild to me that there are only three 1h martial ranged weapons. So much for ranged meta.

Also on the subject of advanced weapons, can we get a way to use them? Most advanced weapons are inaccessible to martials without looking at Pathfinder content. Why are there so many effectively fighter-only weapons in Starfinder?

part of me also kind of wonders if this distinction even needs to exist. Like- is there a specific reason we need to worry about operatives with bows or dwarven scatterguns or throwing knives being mislabeled as guns?

The whole premise being created by the weird definition feels suspect to me. Does anything really break if we just say Operatives get ranged weapons?

Tit for tats never work out well. Try having a conversation with your champion and see if there's a way you could recontexualize things in a way that feels better for him, because at the end of the day you're handing out buffs and bonuses like everyone else and having a martial refuse to participate is kind of a bummer. I'd emphasize how you're handing out bonuses like a bard or marshall and try to focus on how nothing about the way his character needs to play or act or fit within the party needs to change. He's not 'becoming a soldier' or being any more or less involved in a war than before.

You might be able to work something out if you're upfront about how much you want to play this character and try to address his concerns without hostility toward them.

If that doesn't work idk yeah some people just suck try to have your fun with the rest of the party.

double weapon training on a mystic or witchwarper probably is the best way to use the weapon. Proficiency options are limited and they can leverage the caster trait most easily.

Currently the only option for full proficiency is a certain fighter feat, which means either playing a fighter or taking fighter dedication (but that pushes advanced weapon training to level 12).

Operatives are strangely lacking a similar feat, and the proficiency downgrade is way too bad to make it a good trade.

tbh I'm a little baffled that Paizo decided to publish a bunch of weapons that you can't actually get full proficiency for within Starfinder materials.

Let's all remember that a strike is nothing more than an attack roll, and a strike action involves the attack roll and damage.

This is just not correct at all. A Strike is a Strike. Period. There are some things that ask for an attack roll that aren't Strikes, but strike is pretty well defined.

There is no such distinction between strike and strike.

I genuinely don't eve know how you can read an ability telling you to make a Strike and assume it's meant to mean no damage. So many abilities wouldn't work if you applied this broadly and the actual wording is so clear. Maybe a translation issue?

Yes, the problem is the specific rule was written to say when you "can wield" something, not when you "are wielding" it. So it is only logical the then ask "ok, what would cause me to wield things, and how do I avoid wielding them?" Which would lead you to concluding you can do something like hold a laser rifle with one hand, but not hold a laser pistol. Which is stupid... but I'd rather not have rules that depend on "that's stupid, ignore it" as a mechanic.

Disagree. The reason you can't wield things with your offhands is because of the special mechanics of extra arms. That turns a pistol you would normally be wielding into a pistol you're not actually wielding despite holding it correctly.

The idea that it takes away your ability to hold items isn't something I can find easily and it sort of feels like forcing very specific interpretations of the rules to reach there more than anything else.

Why wouldn't you? It's a strike.

What are you trying to do, OP? You're correct that right now Primary Target doesn't ignore unwieldy, but it also almost never matters that it doesn't either.

Why a flat check?

Squiggit wrote:

Yeah that's true (though it also suffers from the same issue as backstabber of being a very small one time bump, I feel like both should be 1/die to keep up with the baseline). I'm also not entirely sure how we're supposed to great PF2 firearm modifications. You're right though I just completely forgot about that item.

Kickback is basically Propulsive, but it requires your strength to scale to it rather than the other way around. Making it one point per die makes it a lot more like a thrown weapon, or arguably loads better because you're also getting whatever cool traits the Kickback weapon has. I'm not sure guns need to eat more of the thrown weapons' lunch.

I'm also not sure that a weapon needs to grant you legendary Weapon Specialization if it's both Backstabber and Kickback, tbh.

Maybe, maybe not, but the feature already exists and is already fairly powerful... at level 1. But the trait budget doesn't change as it becomes increasingly irrelevant as levels scale, which is what feels problematic to me. The relative value declines extremely sharply, which creates an awkward scenario where the damage bonuses are fairly significant at low levels and those traits might as well not exist at higher levels.

My bad about Walking Armory, was away from my books and just glancing at AON, should have double checked.

However, I feel like it was pretty clear in the playstyle and purpose it had. It's very clearly meant as the Area-Fire specialist to contrast with Action Hero focusing on Auto-Fire and guns that can make Strikes. Bombard is for players who are making Area-Fires every turn, and have no choice but to probably-maybe hit some teammates in the process.

I mean to an extent they all are. Area/Auto Fire is just how you attack things as a soldier. There's some room for other builds to do other things, but it's still inevitably something a lot of your options revolve around.

For me the problem with Bombard comes down to the way it works with party dynamics. If I'm in a melee heavy group, Bombard feels obligate just to let me keep doing my thing without being a threat to my own party. We have a From The Front Envoy and a Solarian. I feel less like I'm choosing Bombard over Action Hero positively in terms of pursuing what features I want so much as picking it because the cones from my auto fire attacks are a constant threat to half the party without Bombard's ability to exclude allies.

This is the whole reason why Safe Elements is an easily accessible feat for Kineticists.... imagine if only one element had access to it. It'd suck so much to be put in that position.

Yeah that's true (though it also suffers from the same issue as backstabber of being a very small one time bump, I feel like both should be 1/die to keep up with the baseline). I'm also not entirely sure how we're supposed to great PF2 firearm modifications. You're right though I just completely forgot about that item.

What I mean is that they don't seem to point you to a specific playstyle, nor do they seem to really do a lot of heavy lifting to define your character in the way like Action Hero or Armor Storm do.

Instead they solve basic problems, like wanting to play a low-strength character or having melee allies.

Like if there's a short range party member (sometimes multiple short range party members) I feel almost obligated to take Bombard simply so I can keep using my features without being a nuisance. Battlemaps just frankly aren't always big enough to healthily support a good use of Area weapons with melee allies, especially if you're using cones or lines that are harder to aim.

The problem is they compete against gimmicks that are also unreproduceable and also help define what your character is. So it feels like the Soldier can very easily be forced into picking between a flavorful playstyle or a really basic piece of mechanical QoL to make their character functional. This sucks.

It was a really common criticism in the playtest so it's sort of a shame to see it untouched on release, which makes it even less likely to get addressed, but I still think it's worth repeating. At the very least I hope Paizo maybe considers feat options to let you order explorer your way into some of these benefits later on.

The Safe-Elements aspect of bombard especially really feels like it needs to be a low level option. It's too much of an objectively correct choice if anyone on your team is melee.

One pain point I haven't seen brought up is also scaling. Snipers peak at level 1. Level 1 assassin rifle (assuming offguard) is 1d10+2 with fatal d12, making it one of the hardest hitting weapons in the entire game. You make a Vesk with a Doshko cry when you crit from farther away than most Paizo battlemaps even are, and frankly you're still pretty impressive even when you don't. This does a lot to kind of fulfill the sniper fantasy and deal with the reload issue.

But kickback never scales, and backstabber only gains one extra damage at +3 tracking, at a point at which monster hp is ten times higher.

I really don't understand why kickback and backstabber scale so much worse than other damage enhancing traits (like sweep or agile), it creates a really awkward power dynamic.

Then there's secondary factors like upgrades that provide flat damage and aim itself both scaling up with the number of attacks you can make per round.

The game is too built around improving damage through flat bonuses, which starts to make these low attacks-per-round builds increasingly awkward the longer a campaign goes.

The mechanical problems with the sniper operative were largely pointed out in the playtest and ignored.

TBH a surprising number of big issues with some classes/subclasses just glossed over between playtest and release. Maybe it was crunch or something.

Is there any reason you're both writing off Animated Assault? It's core, common, and does decent damage. Less up front than fireball but sustainable for extra damage. The +2 scaling sucks, but it seems like an obvious pick if I want to blast with Occult.

There should definitely be a way for a player who wants to focus on their Animal Companion to keep them relevant. Although it would have to be a significant portion of their character's power budget.

The more I think about this the more I wonder if it's actually the right way to approach it at all.

Right now Companions require a huge investment and kind of suck, but I wonder how necessary that investment actually is.

Like most feats don't do this. They work and they largely keep working. If I'm a level 1 ranger and take Hunted Shot, it gets to be a core part of my attack routine for my entire career and scales automatically as I scale.

If I spend a feat for a focus spell, it automatically heightens on its own.

The best comparison point is probably familiars. Admittedly familiars are also kind of an iffy proposition, but while familiars have feat chains to make them stronger too, if I take just the basic feat and use it to give my familiar specific functionality I can expect them to be able to offer that throughout a whole campaign.

Why is it that we take for granted then the idea that Animal Companions (and a handful of other feat chains) must actively degrade in functionality over the course of a campaign?

It's one thing to say that animal companions are too strong for a single feat, but the way even just basic scaling is tethered to feat progression goes way beyond that and creates clear shortcomings where they just get actively worse in a way normal feats don't.

ElementalofCuteness wrote:

I really think Starfinder needsa a 12 hit point per level class...Vanguard should have been included.

If player core included all the classes, tech, and rules everybody asked for, the physical printing would require a forklift to move it around. Give some time for supplements to be announced and printed.

PF2 Player Core isn't even a year old and managed to include more classes. The PF2 CRB had twice as many. Both of them are cheaper than SF Player Core.

The book is mostly fine, but it's not really some wild outlandish idea that it could have had a bit more content. Six classes for their big new title is a little anemic.

Constructs have immunity to non-lethal damage, but many constructs also have a weakness to electricity. I think it would be fun if the weakness overruled the immunity, and also on a crit turned the non-lethal into normal damage.

I kind of like this. It is a little goofy that an enemy weak to electricity is arbitrarily immune to certain electrical weapons. There's no real verismilitude to it, an electric shock designed to incapacitate rather than kill a person is still going to not be great for electronic machinery.

Though more broadly I think immunity to nonlethal doesn't make a lot of sense in general, as Dubious Scholar says.

In Starfinder especially the trait becomes really problematic, insofar as that it almost doesn't do anything at all or imposes a semi-permanent -2 to attacks in construct/undead/whatever heavy campaigns... which sort of makes the trait impossible to budget.

Like the Pulsecaster is essentially identical to the laser pistol except it has a shorter range and the nonlethal trait, so it's not even like the weapon is getting some meaningful advantage for its penalty.

As was intended in the old version as well, the Shove is a singular push event, not a rapid combo of pushes.

You are doing one singular multi-Shove vs many adjacent targets, then moving.

The text makes it very clear you're performing five separate checks, though.

Contrast with Swipe which is very clearly a singular event.

I don't disagree, but to play devil's advocate... void isn't evil, it's a natural force that happens to power undeath, and in some respects ghosts feel like an inherently 'pure' form of undead, in the sense there's no necessary intervening matter or special condition, they are just a spirit animated into undeath. In that respect having them be somewhat innately good at manipulating the void energies that help sustain their existence feels very appropriate.

There's a lot of really high concept talk here but... do people have specific things they want arcane to do that it can't or specific types of spells you want to see?

I feel like it's hard to get a grip on what people are looking for when so much of the conversation is more about what other spell lists did or what previous versions of the game looked like.

Also I guess it's worth asking if the problem is arcane or some arcane classes. Like I agree the wizard and inscribed witch are bad, but a lot of that badness comes from their horrible feature set and like... magi are mostly fine (and their problems are more feature related too) and I'm not sure if arcane sorcerers, summoners, or witchwarpers necessarily feel uniquely bad compared to their other subclasses in the same way.

Eh, the old connection was too good but buffing strikes was a big part of the fun. I was hoping it'd get toned down in some way instead.

The spells too. Elementalized spiritual weapon was cool and unique for this kind of character. The summon and enhance weaponry thing created a clear theme that no one else really did.

The new one is probably fine, but there were two or three things that made the old version really stand out to me and those were the things taken out. So... eh. Guess I'm not bringing my playtest mystic into the full game. Very cool.

It also seems as if the "Battle Mystic" play style that they mentioned in the playtest has been de-enphasized. Elements no longer grants extra damage, they have reduced health, and iirc they lost divine weapon familiarity too?

It's a shame, because I still think it's a really fun and interesting play style. Spending combats focusing on strikes + transfers with third actions striding and taking cover, and your spellcasting is mostly combat buffs or out of combat utility. Really interesting and unconventional approach to a typical caster chassis!

Man I hate what they did to Elemental, playtest elemental was such a neat connection.

The action economy is absolutely brutal, yeah. It's especially awkward on a caster-centric archetype since using your horde directly competes with casting spells. It's definitely best as a later combat saving spellslots thing, but I think that's a really unsatisfying fantasy for the kind of person who wants an undead horde.

The base kit is just modified swarmkeeper, which feels weird because swarmkeeper was such a problematic archetype... not a lot to talk about but it feels kind of odd they made the recovery period ten times longer and gave it 4 level scaling instead of 2 level scaling like swarmkeeper. The latter especially feels like an unnecessary nerf that just makes it feel bad at off levels.

As has been mentioned, the way it makes you so much easier to attack is not a great feeling either, especially for a caster who tends to be squishier and likes to use nonstandard defenses.

Deathguard feels mandatory. The benefit is both pretty decent (essentially permaconcealed for everyone except you since enemies can still hit the troop) and the ability to share spaces feels absolutely necessary to keep your party functional. I don't know why they make you wait four whole levels to be able to do this.

I dislike Ghostsong. It's not bad and has cool flavor, but I don't really like the flavor tax, that if you want a ghost army you need to spend an extra feat and, again, wait four levels.

Danse Macabre is kind of stupid because it says you can move through large creatures, but the horde doesn't have enough movement to do that without also taking Shambling March. March is a pretty good feat so it's not a huge deal but I dislike it when feats don't work properly on their own.

It feels weird that Death Rattle is unfriendly given that almost every other ability in the archetype is designed to not harm allies or benefit enemies. Given the incentive to stand inside the horde for defensive benefits it makes the feat feel like a liability.

It kind of makes this archetype feel... begrudging? Like people have been asking for undead hordes for a while and now here's Necrologist take it or leave it.

Here's one that gets me, though it's more a mechanical frustration than a flavor one (though it also hits flavor too).

Three enemies standing next to each other you have 5 bullets in your gun. You can't autofire unless you can reposition yourself such that one enemy is out of the cone.

master dc is basically standard, the only classes that don't get it are ones that never adjust class DC at all.

Almost definitely an error.

Very easy to imagine a writer deleting everything after the first sentence to rewrite the action and then forgetting to add back the proficiency bit.

"Let the modders GMs fix it." is not a common sense fix.

"Change something cool and unintrusive because it requires a workaround for this one person doing one extremely specific thing" is not common sense either though.

It's not that unreasonable to expect that if I want to run some very specific and slightly offbeat scenario as a GM that I might have to make some adjustments to do so.

In fairness, those feats came out considerably later than the Magic Warrior archetype did; Magic Warrior was from World Guide, while those feats are from the final volume of Strength of Thousands.

That kind of makes it worse, doesn't it? The Magic Warrior archetype already existed and no one bothered to let it have access to any of the new feats referencing the magic warriors.

Oh cool another example that suggests something completely different should be happening. Absolutely wild that this basic idea is still so hard to figure out.

So a creature with weakness/resistance to electricity modifies the damage of the basic strike even though no electricity damage is dealt until the end of their turn, and then would never apply weakness or resistance again because the entire persistent damage condition is a single instance?

This seems pretty clearly wrong, especially since the example doesn't even match the rest of the sentence, a plasma doshko dealing persistent electricity on a crit isn't a weapon with a special material or trait, the 'such as' doesn't make sense.

But who really knows at this point.

I'm just not sure the 10m thing is really a problem. Deriven plays the game in a very specific way, so it's somewhat inevitable that the end result radically alters the game balance. Deriven's complained about other classes that rely heavily on recharging abilities too. It's mostly a table thing. It feels kind of like complaining that sorcerers are bad because I set my campaign in a dead magic zone.

The remaster alchemist is undeniably pretty good at what it does, though the permabuffer and mutagenist definitely got off a bit worse with the changes. Still clearly one of the better remaster jobs, and much less of a problematic mess than something like the Oracle.

Oracle, Rogue, and Barbarian are the big winners for me (flavor issues with the Oracle aside). You say rogues got nothing but the qol and save improvements are huge wins for a class that was already so good.

Swashbuckler and Alchemist honorable mentions for some really cool changes but still a couple problem points.

Investigator and Witch to me feel like unfortunate misses. Clear improvements, but missing just enough that it doesn't feel satisfying. The investigator still feels too conservative and too GM dependent and the Witch feels too variable and imo the changes missed some of the real pain points.

Wizard feels like the clear loser. The remake had a cool idea, but did as little as possible with it such that in some ways the class actually got worse.

Dishonorable mention to the Ranger, which while not bad before and technically the recipient of a few QoL buffs ultimately feels so left behind by the remaster and the game in general I don't even see people talk about it.

... I think this thread is the first time I've ever heard someone call Druids bottom of the barrel ngl.

I mean just hard disagree. It's a highly flavorful yet generally not mechanically super powerful (in terms of game numbers) ability because of how specific it is. When it comes into play, it feels very cool, yet because of the nature of how it works, it's not a high powered option that's going to disrupt combat or social encounters dramatically. It's an opportunity to leverage the cool themes of a specific heritage in specific circumstances. This is awesome. We need more stuff like that.

The fact that in some very niche circumstance it can prove disruptive to a story is very much why fixing it should be a table discussion first, rather than a game design issue because the reason it's causing problems is because of the very unique circumstances of the game being described.

It's similar to how spells or abilities that provide easy access to food or certain types of items can trivialize high stakes survival scenarios with scarce resources. The problem is the specific intersection of table goals and mechanics, so a systemic change doesn't make sense.

As someone that is interested in playing, it is quite disheartening that you are so opposed to even the simplest fixes to the most blatant problems.

Dude what? You don't like an ability, other people don't share your concerns. That's not an attack.

This feels like such an over the top reaction to a minor disagreement over an extremely niche heritage option.

Obviously their are some reaction abilities that are absolutely intended to function on the first round of combat, even if you haven't had a turn.

Those would be exceptions. But that is my point, they are exceptions. And there are a great many exceptions.

I mean them being exceptions doesn't remove the problem of the abilities not working properly if you regularly deny characters their reaction before their first turn, when there's often very little to suggest that the abilities are not meant to be used regularly.

Either it gains its actions only when you use Command an Animal at which point Mature Animal Companion needs to be erratad

Why would it need to be erratad? Mature Companion works pretty clearly, except maybe wrt Tridus' question about their interactions with Slowed, but that's pretty separate from this other issue.

And again: under your interpretation, a mature companion that is Slowed 2 has MORE actions if you don't command it than it does if you do. That makes no sense whatsoever.

I mean if you really want mature companions to be slightly worse in this very specific scenario that's fine I guess it's such a minor point I don't really see any value in holding onto it you can have it.

Mature animal companion states that the mature animal companion uses one of their actions to stride or strike. If they have no actions to use then they cannot stride/strike.

Clearly that's not entirely true, since if you don't command the companion they don't regain actions normally. Taking this strictly the mature benefit wouldn't do anything at all since they'd never have the action to spend.

I mean sorry, but that's how retroactively saying they gained actions at the start of the turn that they didn't actually have at the start of the turn because you need to command them for them to have regained actions at the start of their turn reads to me.

It's just a very complicated way to reach the goal you want.

Squiggit wrote:

Regarding when companions gain actions, is this line not pretty unambiguous?

Player Core p206 wrote:

and it gains 2 actions during your turn if you use the Command an Animal action to command it

Seems like it answers the OP's question pretty clearly.

No, it doesn't. It says 'if you use the Command an Animal action', not 'when you use the Command an Animal action'.

"It gains 2 actions during your turn".

When? At what point during your turn does it gain those actions? You are claiming that it gains those actions at the time that it is given commands. There is nothing to say that this is wrong. But there is also nothing in that quote that says that that is the correct point in the turn either.

"if you use the Command an Animal action to command it".

That is a conditional. That is not a designation of when the actions are gained. The companion only gains those 2 actions if it is commanded. But this does not specify when the actions are gained.

This argument is so goofy I don't even know how to parse it.

To try to understand, your contention is that the companion gains actions at some unspecified point of time not when you command them but contingent on if you commanded them but also available for use immediately after you command them?

How does that even play out in practice?

I'd rather just go with what the book says tbh.

I mean I think scale is an issue here. Ten minutes to treat wounds and a whole day to return to town and recover or maybe spend money or go on a sidequest to manage a condition or curse or whatever are radically different amounts of investment.

I don't think it's reasonable to handwave them off as essentially the same, even in the absence of time pressure.

From what you're describing I'd pick Sorcerer. Beast Master is a very nice way to get an animal companion, while bending a druid into a social character with illusion magic is somewhat more difficult. Anecdotally I also find the bookkeeping of prepared casting can be kind of a pain for players who aren't as used to it, so spontaneous might be a nicer experience.

Druid with captivator or psychic to splash mind magic is an option, and generally comes with a sturdier chassis than the sorcerer does, but it feels like more of an uphill struggle to work really well and the double mental attributes will kind of take away from the druid's best features (having a strong chassis and such a powerful stat as their core attribute).

Have to agree with Teridax, "you can work really hard to make simple traps scary" isn't really an argument that simple traps are fine as is.

Part of the problem is that while you can design more robust encounters to make simple traps better, the set dressing of having some trapped object or pathway in a fortress, dungeon, or ruin of some kind is very tropey and thematic, but the current design makes it almost impossible for them to feel meaningful at the same time. Building more complicated encounters doesn't help if you aren't looking for the event to be part of a complicated encounter.