Super Zero's page

Psychic spellcasting removes the need for incantations, not the Auditory trait. Only spells that make sounds have that.

It also doesn't remove Manipulate, and didn't do that before the Remaster, either.
I'd disagree that the common image of psychics involves them only using their minds. I think most often they're depicted touching their heads, touching their targets, and/or directing their powers with a hand.

Though part of that is that an image needs to cover what's happening through imagery.

Mechanically you need to not be prevented from using Manipulate actions (such as from Restrained) and will suffer any failure chances from conditions like Grabbed. And since the spell has a range of Touch, then the target will need to be in your natural reach.

But don't add more mechanics restrictions than that because of narrative description. The Manipulate trait lists making gestures as qualifying, and you can do that with your hands full. And you can make contact for delivering the spell with any body part.

So yes, you can cast Lay on Hands or Vampiric Feast with your hands full.

I vaguely remember it being mentioned as a deliberate clarification that spellcasters are supposed to be able to cast their spells with their hands full. Maybe in the Remaster announcements and summaries of changes? Or maybe I am just hallucinating that.

It was in the core spellcasting rules before the Remaster.

A somatic component is a specific hand movement or gesture that generates a magical nexus. The spell gains the manipulate trait and requires you to make gestures. You can use this component while holding something in your hand, but not if you are restrained or otherwise unable to gesture freely.

Spells that require you to touch the target require a somatic component. You can do so while holding something as long as part of your hand is able to touch the target (even if it's through a glove or gauntlet).

Player Core changed that description and removed the section on somatic components, so it doesn't seem to be spelled out any more. But the only mention of needing a free hand is under Costs and Loci.

As part of Casting the Spell, you retrieve the locus (if necessary, and if you have a free hand), and you can put it away again if you so choose.

Though there's gale blast, a specific spell that does require having a free hand (and gets a bonus if you have two).

A creature larger than the enemy will be much less common, since groups of enemies are often the same size and often larger than the PCs.

The Daredevil's size doesn't change (at least not often). Your proposal is the one that would require checking.

That would generally make the restrictions stricter, not ease them.

And I think the goal here was to give the Daredevil different advantages based on size--the bigger you are, the more targets for your maneuvers, the smaller you are, the more useful props. Changing that will just make bigger better.

Isn't that also quicker and more consistent to adjudicate, as long as you don't have multiple Daredevils of different sizes in the same party?

I was not. Just trying to be funny.

I thought it was, anyway.
But, uh, thanks everyone.

If you don't have anything you want to say in Gameplay, you can "dot and delete."

Make a post--any post, even if it's just a period--and then immediately delete it. Deleting the post won't remove it from your campaigns, so this is a handy trick to add them when you're not ready to make an actual gameplay post.

There are only a few signups so far.
Do I have a bad reputation I don't know about? o.0
...or is it because it's a high-level one shot that people would have to build characters for? I picked that one in part because it's a higher level than anybody is likely to be able to playtest in Society. And in part because I've run all the lower-level ones.

I plan to run the 12th level one, too, if that helps (though I haven't really looked at it yet).

Since it's not a Society scenario, you could always join for no credit if you'd like.

EDIT: And oh sure, any class and ancestry are fine. Including Necromancer and Runesmith if you want. They're not actively being playtested right now, but why not?

Five isn't that large. Nine... Split into two tables?

Inventor has always had that. They were the first class that did, I believe.

No, it's a half scenario. 2 XP, 2 Rep, 4 days downtime, 5 Treasure Bundles. The Society character can be any level.

They've dropped. Have you checked the store? New things don't drop to the old page any more, there's a library under the store tab.

You could also just run a non-PFS adventure.

I might do that, actually.

Though the character did get marked Dead under the old playtest rules (except for Bounties), too. They worked like pregens, and that's part of the pregen rules--you designate a Society character they're standing in for, and all rewards and consequences apply to that character.

Incidentally, unrelated to the playtest, as I read the Adventure Mode rules you could convert an adventure to a different edition of the same game and still report it for credit. Do I have that right?

I've been wanting to get around to running Signal of Screams, though if I do it at this point I'll probably convert to second edition.

No, that's how it used to work. The new rule is that you can just build characters normally using playtest classes, and those characters remain legal until the classes are published (at which point they must be updated to the final rules).

Including for the other two as-yet-unpublished classes.

So you can just build Necromancers, Runesmiths, Daredevils, and Slayers and play them normally, with the caveat that using these characters in games requires the GM to opt in.

That is explicit.

While I'm very much in favor of playtesting and having lots of options for characters, players should be aware that not every GM keeps up with the playtest material.

Personally, I'm not able to keep up with published stuff, much less playtest stuff - I'm pretty familiar with Player Cores 1&2, Secrets of Magic (un-Remastered), Guns & Gears (un-Remastered), Dark Archive (un-Remastered), Book of the Dead (un-Remastered), and Rage of Elements. I'm still working on Howl of the Wild and War of the Immortals, but don't even own Battlecry. I'm not as active as I used to be, but I bet there are a lot of people in my position where the books are simply coming out faster than I can play through them.

If someone showed up at my table with a necromancer or runesmith, 10 minutes ago, I wouldn't have even known that those classes existed - I completely missed the playtest and any announcement of it, much less the nuances of playing one in PFS. I only heard about them (as well as the current playtest) through this second-hand discussion.

Don't get me wrong, players at my tables will still be welcome to bring playtest material, and I'll try my hardest, but PCs have to understand that I'll be taking their word for things a lot of the time. The excess burden is going to have to be taken up by the PCs, especially if there are multiple classes I'm unfamiliar with (like exemplar / animist / guardian / marshal). I know I can't be the only GM that feels this way.

That's true, but players really should have down how their own characters work.

Like you said, you can't be expected to be intimately familiar with every class as a GM. I've got most of them down, but there are a few I don't know well. That isn't necessarily more true of playtest classes.
(Though they're opt-in for GMs for other reasons, regardless.)

That's how it used to work. As I read it, the new option to just create a character with a player class replaces the old option.

Maya where is the link for the playtest?

It's in the linked blog post.

And also right here.

No level 3 PC needs a natural 20 to overcome this curse. Even if they get to Drained 4, the worst case scenario is Con -1, Trained in Fort, Drained 4, for a net +0 against DC 17.

It's more common for PCs to just make the save. Last time I ran a wight,I didn't think anybody got cursed.

Probably it's just a failure of the game designers of this AP. It's not so rare to happen once that the lore writer of an AP is not always the same that choose the monsters and not the same who draw maps and so on. So eventually we find some inconsistencies like this with a monster having an unpredictable ability that doesn't make too much sense with the AP lore.

I suggest you to create a small side quest to remove the curse allowing the players to find a way to remove the curse. I know that this may be some extra work specially if you are an inexperienced GM. But probably it's the easier way to deal with it.

An above-average amount of something showing up isn't a failure. What's the contradiction even supposed to be here?

The OP did not mention any lore, or even specify which adventure party they're playing.

Apparitions aren't distinct creatures, unless you take the familiar feat. That's exactly what it does.

Assuming they permit playtest characters in Society as usual, my games will be open to them.

There's only one person ignoring part of the text there.

"Ah, well dear lady you are rather... terrifying." He stands, with an incline if his head and s wink towards Callistro. "Unless there's anything else, we'll take our leave. Have a lovely evening."

He signals to his cohorts to collect the crate with the remaining items, and they leave the room.

[Ooc] Anything the you'd like to do before heading back? [/B]

Neither. You get one ancestry feat.

It does not have to be a lineage feat, but you don't get one for free either.

It's not exactly the same as if it were inflicted outside your turn, though. Stunned isn't supposed to stack with slowed when subtracting actions at start of turn... but it sounds like the new ruling implies you could lose 1A to being slowed and then get stunned midturn and lose another action. It's an edge case, but it doesn't sit right with me. It's all edge cases for this ruling, sure, but...

To be clear, the way you want it to work is that the target loses the rest of their turn, can't use reactions for a round, and loses one more action next turn, but losing one action this turn is too much?

Psychics have some self-stunning options.

That's not true. I've seen at least one scenario where the PCs are told they should go buy some, in fact.

But it's really more of a solution to a particular problem. If you have a character who wants to be mounted regularly you really need a companion.

I have one character who purchased a mount because she needed to speed up some travel time. It did not survive to the end of the scenario, though it lasted long enough to accomplish the objective.

1. Contemplative Starlit Span Magus, Time Traveler background (even though it's kind of a bad fit for a Contemplative). I haven't played Magus before or even seen one in play much, but ranged damage and knowledge skills, I think.
2. Yes
3. Yes; I've been using block Initiative as a pbp GM for quite a long tiem now.
4. Yes

Oh, I never asked to be a reporter.

I would like to be a reporter, please.

Commander is certainly an interesting one to have out of tier.

According to today's blog, the Gen Con 2026 PFS schedule will, with the exception of the special, consist exclusively of new format scenarios (that is, the 3hr, no stat block format scheduled to debut next month). That means that literally all PFS content from 2025 or earlier -- six and a half out of seven seasons, or 93% of existing PFS 2e content -- will be entirely absent from organized play at the largest gaming convention in the world.

While I've given up any hope of response from Paizo to the community's concerns about the scenario changes, I can't help but be curious what the "of course the scenario changes won't reduce the variety of content being offered" crowd from a few months back would say now...

Uh, isn't that normal? I've only ever been to a smaller con, but they never schedule old scenarios, only ones from the last season.

Any particular scenarios folks are hoping to see during Outpost?

I'm considering a high tier table of 4-17 - Trapping the Hag's Claw for Outpost if there is enough interest.

Please!

The wererat's sword deals better damage than his claws or jaws.
The werewolf's battle axe deals the same damage as their jaws.

But the weretiger for higher-level parties doesn't have a melee weapon, and his jaws have Grab. Of course, that won't be level 1 and 2 PCs. Mostly. At least, not without a level bump.

I think the down threads here always disappear pretty quickly.
And they're not exactly tricky...

Maybe I shouldn't do math at 5:30 in the morning.

I counted level 1 as 1 CP instead of 2. ...and I didn't add the point for the fourth one, either.

Well, never mind then.

I'm sorry, I'm sick. Just a cold, but I've been moving slow. May postpone getting that started a day or so.

Man Class DC really is such a terrible mechanic.

Uh, why? What's wrong with it?

I don't understand why you would even attempt to claim otherwise. It also doesn't really strike me as a particularly honest approach to what is ultimately a relatively straightforward rules question that has been resolved by bringing up the actual rules.

This post contains multiple quotes that you then claim say entirely different things.

"Certain abilities" use the class's spell DC because they explicitly say so. There appears to be this extreme keenness to ask for justification on why class DC would apply here, yet an equal keenness to jump to the conclusion that one can just substitute spell DC at-will by default without providing a scrap of evidence in the rules for this.

"Certain abilities" is from your rules quote, and it was about Class DC...

The rules for Critical Specialization say to use Class DC when appropriate. That's why abilities that let you use Spell DC instead say so, because they're an exception.

Nobody said anything about substituting Spell DC for Class DC other than you.

Hopefully they will also automatically apply the weak/elite templates.

AoN already has that feature. There's a button near the top of any monster stat block.

What debate?

The books explicitly state how it works. Some individual things have minor oversights, like Psi Burst not actually specifying its DC (but it's also really not unclear), but that's almost inevitable and really doesn't have anything to do with how Class DCs are calculated.

Much like how certain things are red, therefore everything is red by default.

That is not at all what that says.
And abilities that use Class DC also explicitly specify it.

I don't believe that is a rule.

You don't have to add sessions. You can just report them.

Other than the fact that it makes sense, of course, since they measure entirely different things. Oh look, a reason! Why would Wizards be the best at critical specialization and other martial abilities just because their shield are difficult you resist?

As for casters "having" them, that would be in the rules for Class DC. Some of them aren't proficient, which means they'll be terrible at the things that use it, but being terrible isn't the same thing as the game not functioning because the value doesn't exist.

I haven't played 1-00 or 1-05 yet. 1-00 is pregens only though, right?

If you make a Strike as part of the transcendence, it would be the one Ikon that prevents you from getting your bonus damage from your weapon.

Huh. Okay, looks like a little glitch in the new website.

I don't see the sanctioning document linked on the store page for the physical book. It is on the store page for the PDF version, but the link isn't underlined like links usually are it otherwise marked (at least on mobile). The words "free download" are the link.

And you can always get Chronicles from RPG Chronicles.net.

As for Reputation, the reporter has to enter that. If you reported it, that's easy enough. Double-check it and edit it if it's missing.

1. The next two characters I was planning to start are an awakened animal Commander (support) and a contemplative Magus (ranged combat).
2. Yes
3. Been using block Initiative for pbp for 20 years now
4. Sure

Those actions are the classes' primary shticks.

Same with the Exemplar. Moving your Spark around to have different powers active is their entire gameplay concept.