+1 from me on the monster harvesting idea. Its a long tradition in fantasy stories of using parts from magical creatures for various things. From the wizard wanting exotic potion ingredients to the barbarian wearing trophies of his kills. It couldn't be hard to include in the monster entries a line saying something like: dc 17 survival(or nature): harvest 1d4 units of dragon blood value 100 each. its a way to allow even creatures with no reason to be carrying treasure to have something to make the fight worth while. It also allows for the addition of future "extra detail" systems like the optional alchemical material component rules for magic in P1.
Milo v3 wrote: 21) In the womb before you were born, your body assimilated your twin's body with your own. Even though this caused her to never be born, her soul happened to already be in her body, causing it to partially merge with your own flesh and hide within your undeveloped mind. Beyond: Two Souls anyone?(although that game could be considered the spiritualist in a nutshell) 27.) You wanted power. The demon offered power. You didn't realize what a horrible mistake you made until the demon possessed your body and squeezed your soul out. Now, still tethered to your body, you are forced to serve your new master. You are the phantom, and he is you.
Lukas Stariha wrote: Did the Spiritualist do anything of note? You don't appear to have mentioned that character at all lol. The spiritualist focused more on role playing his character being haunted. Guy kept talking to himself... However, he did use the phantom in incorporeal form to do a lot of scouting. We discovered though that that phantom cant really attack in incorporeal form, so he ended up not doing much fighting. Not his fault, the medium kept rushing into the fights before the spiritualist got a chance to change his phantom to corporeal form.
Luthorne wrote: Since trapfinding seems often asked for, what if it was a resonant power for either abjuration or divination? Say, granting the ability to disarm magical traps as well as a bonus on Perception checks to spot them equal to +2/+3 per point invested in the object? Or perhaps, a bonus on Disable Device checks to disarm traps? Just a thought...would let people who want to get into some trapfinding have it, while those for whom it doesn't fit their concept can just avoid it. Sounds good to me. Trapfinding seems a perfect fit for a divination implement, like a dowsing rod or a scrying pendulum.
Thanatos95 wrote:
And now I realize I misread. The focus for implanting in armor gives armor enchantments, similar to the transmutation focus does for weapons.
Today my regular group tried out 5 of the classes as a team. We had all but the Kineticist and played at level 5 in a home brew dungeon crawl. I played as a melee tank style occultist. Seemed to work alright. I took abjuration, and transmutation in order to access the various offense and defence buffs. Took conjuration as a backup just to put the cure spells on my list. Never actually had to cast them, but it let me use a CLW wand for out of battle heals reliably. I outfit the occultist with a longsword, breastplate, and heavy shield. When combined with the focus powers from Abj. and Trans. I was able to get a pretty good AC. What really made it was putting 6 focus into the sword to give it keen and flaming. during the dungeon crawl, i was able to use the object reading power a few times on plot items, but didn't really get anything useful out of it. I think our DM didn't really know how to use that kind of skill in play. Still, Flavor-wise I think it worked pretty well, and it let me identify some potions we found. The dungeon was a typical wizards lair, with some conjured devils, hirelings, and, as a surprise, a basilisk. The Basilisk was the most difficult fight. None of our classes had any useful skills or spells to really deal with it other than direct blasting from our psychic. The medium tried rushing in to beat it down, but failed his second save. The mesmerist... Ahh the mesmerist. The mesmerist was completely useless in that fight. The range of his stare abilities was the same as the basilisks stone gaze. We joked that the mesmerist would loose a staring contest with the basilisk. As for my occultist, I ended up dropping the sword i had invested my focus in(and feats) to use my backup bow to fight from a safe distance. We managed to win, using a number of the psychics spells to blast it. I was able to show off the occultist's skills in a fight with a bearded devil and 2 imps. On the previous turn, the bearded devil managed to inflict its infernal wounds ability on the medium, so when it tried to attack me, I activated the abjuration implement Warding Shield as an immediate action. Negated the hit completely(10 points of negation blocking 7 damage) thus preventing the infernal wounds. The psychic player was impressed, wanting to know how often i could do that. (only once more at that point) I personally didn't have any trouble tracking the focus i put into my items, but that may be because I only used 2, my sword for trans. and my cloak for abj. Using the warding shield took 2 of the 5 points in my cloak, reducing the AC bonus it was giving me from +2 to +1. At the end of the night, we all agreed that we liked the classes, and saw a lot of potential. We also agreed that occult classes only lacked a lot of basic role potential. No one had a full BAB or higher than a D8 HD, so we whiffed a lot of attacks. My melee build only ended up with a +10 to attack after everything was accounted for, so I was far behind on damage dealing potential compared to a fighter or barbarian. Personally, I felt more like a cleric. Tanky, with a number of potential special abilities to adapt to the situation. I can also see that there are a number of build possibilities with the occultist, and that makes it a class Ill look into again in the future, perhaps with a High Int build to go more caster style. Sorry for long post, Hope this info is of some help!
As for persuit, we usualy dont bother for 2 reasons. 1, that best of 3 rolls thing or combat dosent happen just annoys players. 2, they never fail the rolls anyway. This is due to the super high profession sailor checks the 2 pilots have. First thing they did on hitting port the first time was buy rings of profession sailor +5. This means none of the prewritten random encounter ships can outrun them, and most cant outfight them. Thats why i was looking into monster encounters.
I am looking to spice up my players time in skull and shackles. Right now they controll 2 ships so the usual pirate encounters just arnt too interesting. So, I am looking for good aquatic monster to throw at them in a "moby dick" kind of sea battle. What sea monsters would be good to fight their ships, when they use the ship combat rules? I already tried a dragon, but with its flight, that just didnt work out. My players are at 4th level right now, so it cant be something that would just climb on deck and one shot them either. Is there something like a lower CR charybdis that you guys know off?
I have been playing this combo in a homebrew campaign and i find it to be quite powerful. I took a katana as my weapon and it makes me the partys best damage dealer. In addition, i have the best initiative and AC, dispite not wearing armor due to kensai bonuses. The spellcasting loss is not that big a deal, i still have enough spell slots to load up useful spells like shocking grasp, but I found it beter to focus on buff spells rather than blasts. One of the best spells I found myself using was monstrous physique 1, turning into a gargoyle. It gave me improved Str, armor, extra natural attacks, and flight. My primary Damage output came from combining the bladebound and normal magus weapon enhancing arcanas. I was level 8, yet in combat my sword would easily become a +5 keen with just a swift action. The reduced arcana points hurt some, but you also have less things to spend it on due to kensai removing some arcanas. All together, I had a lot of fun playing as as robe wearing death dealer. (in one combat i OHKO'd a T-rex using this guy...) The only real issue is everyone else at the table making Bleach references when i attack.
Stabatha wrote:
I've kinda wondered that myself. They do less damage than claws, and they count as secondary attacks so they swing at -5. The only use I can see is for flavor. To make it stranger, they can only be take once, so you can't make a horse! Maybe Ultimate Combat will have more to do with them. EDIT: I have an idea: Why not make it so that hooves increase the base land speed of the eidolon by another 10ft? That would fit, and make them more useful.
Morgen wrote: If your a low level sorcerer remember to not waste your known spells on traps like Mage Armor and to a lesser extent Shield. They're fine on scrolls or in potion form, but they're a drain on your actual abilities until you have some high level slots. I find it best to just take one of them, usualy Mage Armor. That way I can have decent AC, and it can be cast on my party members as well(which shield can't) That makes it useful enough I think. Also, as a sorcerer, you can swap out spells known as you level so if you take these at low levels, you can always get rid of them later.
Roland Deschain wrote:
A lot of it is DM style. In my games, I dont bother with making the players identify items, it's too much work for what amounts to a small amount of roleplaying. I think RAW uses Spellcraft to identify magiv items and Appraise for mundane normaly though.
I was just figuring that the bladebound magus seemed to fit the Bleach soul reapers rather well. Part caster, part swordsman, intelegent blade that you can transform into a stronger version. Just stick em in black robes any you have it. Of cource you could also use that to make a case for Jedi, especily with the force damage ability on the blade...
Gorbacz wrote:
Elric? No, Ichigo...
Something i've been wondering about the greater versions portal. Does the portal have to be in a fixed location? Or can it be anchored to something mobile? For example could i put it in a simple cloth sack to create the biggest bag of holding ever? Or better yet, in a blue wooden box that has a permanent fly spell on it...
I play a dwarf alchemist in Kingmaker, and roleplay that my bombs are blackpowder charges with a mercury fulminate trigger. I keep the triggers seperate till i actualy throw the bombs, so no accidental detonations. To better the roleplaying, I even looked up the old alchemical names for the ingredients of those chemicals. That really impressed my dm when i told him i was making a mixture of aqua fortis and quicksilver.(it also helped that ethanol is one of the ingredients. what else would a dwarf use as a weapon besides booze?)
Alexander Kilcoyne wrote:
He's got a point. The alchemist mutagen already supports this kind of flavor for the class. It probably dosent need a new style for a drunken alchemist. In fact, i played a dwarf alchemist in kingmaker, and he was frequently drunk, though with his poison resistances it was hard to get that way.
Gunner-Recall wrote:
Check out the Dhampir race in the beastiary 2. Its decended from vampires, and is healed by negative energy and vice versa.
My DM and i figured that since it wasnt clear, i could summon a skeleton or zombie of any creature legal for the template and fitting the HD requrements of the ability. Thats why Ive been looking around for the strongest natural attackers at each HD increment. At 3HD its looking like the wolverine is the winner.
Thanks for reply! The problem with using weapons and armor on the skele/zom is that the Raise The Dead ability only lasts 4 rounds for me. That dosent really give me the time to arm the creature i summon. Though i suppose i could keep a large size greatsword or something on me and hand it to a zombie giant i summon the turn he appears. Also, while I am a necromancer type, im actualy playing a good character. Im sort of a voodoo shaman that talks to the spirits. I flavor my skeleton summoning as me letting the spirits take corporeal form to get revenge on the bad guys that wronged them. Due to that, I dont plan on ammassing huge armies of undead to follow me around. I've done that on a previous character, and it was a bookkeeping nightmare.
I am playing an oracle of bones in my current campaign and just hit level 3. I took the raise the dead revalation at level 1 and it has been very useful. However, I am having trouble finding good creatures to zombify or skeletonize as I progress. At level 2 I used a skeleton horse, and it was pretty effective. So im looking for suggestions on creatures to use, and what the best creatures at each level would be. I basicly only use them for combat, so im looking for creatures that can dish out big hits. Ive also noticed that zombies seem to be slightly less useful for this, due to their bonus HDs. Those HD mean you would have to summon a lower level creature than you normaly would. anyone else run into this?
I just wanted to point out, the pourpose of the launching crossbow is that as a regular weapon, it can fire 10 range increments. Bombs are thrown weapons, so they can only go 5. So while the bow has the same increment, it has double the range. Also, other alchemical items for throwing like acid flasks only have a 10' range increment, so the bow is 4 times the range for them.
I think the recharge mechanic is an interesting idea, but i agree that using kills for it is a bad idea. I would leave on the crit recharge though, thats rare enough that you cant rely on it. My concern here though is that so many gunslinger deeds dont actualy take grit, they just require you to have some available. How much grit is a gunslinger likely to use in a day?
Kierato wrote:
I thought DR stacked if it was of the same type. Barbarians and adamantine armor both give dr /- so they would stack.
Ive been playing a dwarf Alchemist in Kingmaker and im the party tank/beatstick in a 3 man group. With just a few rounds of prep time I turn into a huge size warrior with magical defences and a huge Str bonus. Being profficent with battleaxes automaticly helps. Im planning on taking the sticky poison discovery at level 6 and poisoning not only my weapons, but my partys too. Nothing make an axe to the face more fun that con poison on it! Im also considering taking a level or 2 of barbarian. That would give me martial weapons, medium armor, and rage to make my tanking even more absurd. Edit: He also uses his alchemical skill to experiment with new beers. This makes him very popular during downtime.
jtokay wrote:
Pretty much, yea. You can attack, you just have to watch out for your weapon bouncing off the ground. Magic is also a good idea, if the spell dosent need an attack roll, it has no penalty.
VRMH wrote:
I would rule yes, but if you silence it, it only works on the ones that can see you, and if you still it it only works on the ones that can hear you. Use both though and i would say it becomes useless.
I tend to prefer prepared spellcasters, because when making a character, i find myself hating having limited options. Playing a wizard type allows me to potentialy be prepared for anything. In addition, it seems to let me be more creative. I can usualy think of a lot of ways to use magic in a situation, but a sword is a lot more limited.
I dont think there would be any problem with the pally code either. If i recall, it says you many not knowingly associate with evil, but your doing it unknowingly. Personaly, I think the Fighter should be congratulated for doing such a good RP job of hiding his evilness from the paladin within game rules.
Drax Stoutblast is a dwarven alchemist who worked as a mining engineer till his father the mine owner told him to go out and see the world, get some real experience under his belt. Suggested he come back in a hundred years to take over the family business. During his non adventuring down time, he is usualy going over surveyers maps looking for good mining sites.
jtokay wrote:
And then if Will Smith played you in the movie, you'd be the Wrath of the Hitch Lich Witch Twitch King
Do you think repeating crossbows can be reloaded like normal crossbows? Normaly they are reloaded by using the bolt racks, but it would open up some options if the can be reloaded in the normal single shot style, including using rapid reload. I havent seen any rules on the subject, so i'd thought id see what the boards thought. Im planning on using a repeater in an upcomming campaign and want to see how much i can get out of it. While on the subject, do you think a repeater could hold a bolt "in the chamber" so that it effectivly has 6 shots before reloading? Edit: Sorry about the post title, i caught it too late, and the forum wont let me edit it.
Gruuuu wrote:
But coming back from the dead might give you some mental health issues, making you the Lich-Witch-Twitch-King.
I have no sources, but my gut says that you can. Dimensional lock and anchor seem meant to prevent phsycal travel, using spells like dimension door, ect. I dont see how it could effect a soul. If it could, that would be saying that the lock would prevent a soul from leaving the physical plane after it died in the first place, and that is the provence of trap the soul, a 9th level spell.
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