TheJew's page

Been awhile since I have been on the forums, but after reading over this information I have a few thoughts, that I will have to test out once the playtest begins.

First to those talking about CLW I recall heavy use of such items as well, although my party generally ported over the belt of healing from 3.5 (750gp 3 charges per new dawn, 1 charge as an action heals 2d8hp, each additional charge used as part of the action healed an extra 1d8)
Each of our characters purchased one as early as we could to cover emergency healing (IE the cleric is down, party split, or out of combat conserving spells).

Now that I have gotten that out of the way my analysis of the currently presented data.

First a rose by any other name, they have different names for actions but as long as they state what they consume I really don't worry about what they name them.

Second: resonance: the base concept I really like, gives a value to charisma for all characters taking it away from being the defacto dump stat except for possible the artificer, but still making it not a huge investment by allowing level to go into it.

Third: resonance use: Investiture, for permanent items, a once per day toll to have access to the feature, allows to be handed over to someone else and let them have access, this sounds good to me. The 24 hour wait time has me concerned on one hand bad guy can't take my staff and use it against me, on the other hand I can't start using his staff after we beat him for 24hours. This may require some retooling.
I think overall making it so you need to spend RP on your items to keep them active each day is fine, but I think it is a good idea to setup with the GM an agreement of auto paying for some items (ring of protection type stuff)
As for a previous example someone did of the ring of water breathing I think this is a great thing, vs. item slots.

Consider this I can wear 8-10 rings now, rather than 2, I don't have to spend any points on the ring of water breathing until I am in a situation that calls for it. It sounds like investiture is a single action and most characters can hold breath for 1 round if needed.

My concern comes from the Staff and what it also might imply for wands.

If I recharge the wand each time I put investiture into it then I am still having to track charges which from the blog does not sound like the overall goal.

My recommendation is to make it friendly to resource management and non-casters
Staff of healing alt: spend 1 action and 1 resonance to cast healing lv 1 (this spell if I recall from earlier blogs allows you to spend additional actions to have a range, or area affect, I assume this works the same but does not eat additional resonance) you could then spend additional resonance as part of casting to increase the level of the spell.
The staff would also allow you to invest in it to give you spontaneous access to its spells of which you could spend your own spell slots on.
Invested characters still gain +1 to healing spells

This reduces the amount of tracking the player has to do, gives non-casters an option that works with said staff, but still makes it better for casters. While non-casters still have a benefit for investing if they choose to do so.

The consumable items have always been hit or miss with my party, and that includes potions, my players tend to shy away from one use items, which generally makes sense economically. Also we tend to play home games which has an effect on that too.

That being said items tuned to certain fighting styles and feats sounds neat to me, I think that the resonance system itself is a solution to the trinkets being consumed, I think a one use consumable should probably not consume any points. Better yet make it so you can spend the resonance to not consume the item.

This makes it so if you over spend and fail the check you have to give up the item to use its ability and then find or buy another later on.

Just some thoughts for now, really not sure what this says about how scrolls would work as well.

I feel the need to put in two cents,

so here I go.

Gnomes can be quite effective little buggers, I found that they make excellent mounted cavaliers and paladins, +2 con, and +2 cha is nice, and the ability to take ones mount into the dungeon is also a major benefit.

a Gnome Bard also can be quite the boon to the party although it is not always fun when you get stuffed into a box so the party can claim they have invented a radio. Still probably out most exciting infiltration plan to date.

Size can be an issue but they are strong for choices where size is not a big deal, IE casters. a gnome cleric has some extra hp and a boost to his charisma abilities, going with oracle or other charisma based casters makes it even better, a gnome sorcerer can do some good damage, and take a beating.

When I first started GMing I was given some advice that I feel helped me a lot.

First: keep it in the game, if anything happens in the game it stays in the game, this applies to the players and the gm.
Second: your a good GM if everyone had fun (including you) your a great gm if everyone had fun and a story was told.
Third: Lord of the rings is how most people think the game is going to be played, slayers is how most of the games end up.
Fourth: it is not the GM vs. the players, nor the players vs. the GM.

I would also like to add that it always helps to know what the party wants out of a game, a lot of my games were run to help de-stress the group either from school based stress or work based stress. In these games we therefore used lots of comedy, and sometimes we just had to fight endless monsters till the barbarian finally felt better, after studying for 5 days straight for an exam.
And remember never be afraid to ask people what they are looking for in a game.

hope this helps

While I know this is a moot and silly point but I feel that a proper build with heavy emphasis on social skills can end most of these fights excluding the shoggoth and tarrasque.
Linnorms are generally Le which means we can deal, same with pitfiend, Balor much more on the chaos side might have to kill him, or better yet banish. remember with enough prep work nothing is impossible. Dust of dryness is the bane of shoggoth and other oozes makes it a quick kill. The Tarrasque takes a bit of work but I once built a brawling fighter lv 20 that could take him with his hands, just have to remember to buy a luck blade or a wish ring with at least one use available to end that fight.

So on the list of things needed, we need the ability to Banish a Balor, a big box of dust of dryness, some bribes, and a ring of freedom of movement because when fighting the Tarrasque you need to avoid being grappled and swallowed if you want to beat him to death, is what I learned.

just a quick note you can still downgrade other actions for lesser ones, IE move for a swift
so round 1 swift action to kirin stance
move action sacked for swift action identify
standard action fireball (because why would I close into combat as a wizard)

make spell attack since it is a swift action spent after the attack already hit

scorching ray: hits 4d6 damage swift action to apply +14 damage
second ray: hits 4d6 damage (sacrifice move action) +14 damage

congrats you can get 2 buffs on these per turn as long as you don't move

not as bad as it looks

although yes feat taxes and level prerequisites can be costly
still I would consider this as a Magus, as well as I would say that this is something really nice for someone going duelist