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The new Avenging Runelord mythic destiny has all its spells based on Charisma, because they're innate spells. This makes this destiny unusable for INT- & WIS-based classes, like Runelord Wizards or Clerics of Lissala. (see here)

Please add a sentence that allows a character to choose INT/WIS/CHA as spellcasting ability modifier for the spells gained from this mythic destiny.

The new mythic content from the Revenge of the Runelords adventure path - Player's Guide and Lord of the Trinity Star - can be found on Demiplane:

Mythic Callings

• Doomsayer's Calling
  
• Dreamer's Calling
  
• Runelord's Calling
  
• Saga's Calling
  

Mythic Destinies

• Avenging Runelord
  
• Heroic Scion
  
• Timewracked
  
• Warshard Warrior
  

First thoughts:

Both the new callings & destinies are cool & thematic to that adventure path.

The mythic callings suffer a bit from many mythic feats not being updated to work with them, i.e. many mythic feats still have the old callings as prerequisite, thus cannot be taken with the new callings.

The mythic destinies are more powerful/useful than the old mythic destinies and more broadly applicable than just to few classes. I bet a lot of people will like them and want to play with those more "mythic-feely" destinies.

Though I hope there's a bit of an errata coming along to fix the issue with the calling prerequisites as well as an errata to the Avenging Runelord mythic destiny:

When taking the Avenging Runelord dedication feat, a character should be allowed to choose which ability score to use for the spells gained from this destiny. Currently these spells are all innate spells, which means they're all exclusively based on Charisma. This makes this destiny a bad choice for Runelord Wizards (!!!) or any other non-CHA based character. Sorcerers, Oracles, Bards, and Thaumaturges can make much better use of this destiny than INT- or WIS-classes, like Runelord Wizards or Clerics of Lissala, which feels wrong.

Tiny Sprites can jump as high as gargantuan Titans.

I think that the increasing character complexity is a defining 2e game feature, as it rewards players for mastering the system , especially now that character building mastery is much less of a thing than back in 1e.

If you're playing with PWL you also have the option of homebrewing things along the game design idea. So you can let players advance in level and give them the new things without improving the damage/heal & HP scale. This is often very easy to do with spells that have a H+1 entry, e.g. a 1st- or 2nd-rank Fireball for 2d6 / 4d6 damage respectively won't break anything, yet broaden the capabilities of your casters (& Kineticists). On martials you can withhold higher level runes. You'll have to be a bit careful with buffs/debuffs and multi-target options (e.g. Desiccate¹), but they work as well with de-heightening - it's mostly utility & "wall of text"-spells that need actual restriction. Slam Down & Synesthesia are strong options when playing at "damage level 5" for example, but they're not game-breaking and thus expand your character's options rather than power.

¹ I recommend de-heightening d10+ damage spells by reducing the number of dice by 1 and the die size by ½ per spell rank, so a 5th-rank Desiccate (H-3) would go from 10d10 to 7d7.

You can get the Fey Sorcerer's advanced bloodline spell via the Glamour fey ancestry feat.

Acrobat/Celebrity/Dandy/Gladiator would have an awesome feat in Costume Change which allows you to remove your enemy's armor:

You can remove any armor as a 3-action Interact activity.

:D

PF2E, every spell - unless Subtle is used or the spell says otherwise in its entry - gives off some sort of visual and/or sound-based display, per Player Core. IE, if someone casts a spell, everyone around knows a spell is cast.

Now, that visual display can be flavored by the caster however they see fit. If a cleric of Desna casts Bless, maybe a field of butterflies comes down and fills the area of the spell to guide the cleric's allies; and maybe Fear cast by a worshipper of Zon-Kuthon might make the targets see elements of body horror happening to themselves in their mind.

But with every spell, the exact flavoring is endless. However, in universe, that flavoring is part of the spell casting.

That's exactly where you're wrong. You are confusing visual/sensory effects of a spell with the act of spellcasting. In the Pf2e rules only the casting of a spell has obvious manifestations & effects, but the spell itself does not have any of those unless it's part of the spell description or the spell effect creates them (e.g. fireball, entangling flora).

Neither Fear nor Bless have any sensory effects and are completely imperceptible, unless you have a way to sense magic (e.g. Detect Magic, Read Aura, Magic Sense, ...). The Fear and Bless spells only have sensory perceptible manifestations on/around the caster during the act of spellcasting.

The Subtle trait only removes those manifestations during the act of spellcasting. It has no effect on the sensory manifestations of the spell effect itself: a fireball still has a flaming explosion, force barrage still shoots a magical shard at an enemy, a mist spell still obscures everything in fog.

The key thing here, IMO, is that when you, an ally, or an enemy Casts a Spell in a fight, or even in a social encounter, everyone *knows* that you have done so. It is clear and obvious, so with the Control example, the people in the battle would see:

a) A spell is cast;
b) Nothing seems to happen - no explosions, no walls just appearing, no one getting sick, or becoming scared, no wounds healing, etc.
c) A moment later, one of their allies just stabs another ally.

Again, your "nothing seems to happen" is super metagamy: what about all the other things that happened during this combat round?

Now, the Subtle Metamagic hides all of this. If you cast a spell with Subtle, then there are no signs, and in that case, no someone should not suspect magic was being used, unless they had some sort of special sense that let them detect it, and those seem to be very rare. That's the benefit of Subtle, to hide casting, but at an action cost.

I don't believe you. Because the very scenario you described happens with or without Subtle spell:

the people in the battle would see:
A spellcaster doing something odd that you don't know what it was.
Nothing seems to happen - no explosions, no walls just appearing, no one getting sick, or becoming scared, no wounds healing, etc.
A moment later, one of their allies just stabs another ally.

Subtle doesn't change your scenario. When your ally suddenly attacks another ally, then you would still suspect mental magic, even if you didn't see that spellcaster cast a spell.

They might not know the specific spell, and they might not know how it works, but the sequence of: person casts spell, nothing seems to happen, then an ally attacks another ally for no reason would strongly indicate mental control was being used.

Can you expand on the part "nothing seems to happen", because a lot of stuff happens in a combat round and all of that could have been influenced by the unknown spell, e.g. all attacks are influenced by Bless, Benediction, Bane, Malediction, Heroism, Protection, Calm, ... .

Unless an ally behaves obviously weird, there is no indication that they're under mental control. Otherwise, are you having people roll Sense Motive when they're fleeing from a non-magical effect to check if magic is involved?

For example: Enemy spellcaster casts an unknown spell, then another enemy yells some orders (End it!), and three of your allies start running away. Would you suspect that the spellcaster used a Fear spell?

Or: Enemy spellcaster casts an unknown spell, then suddenly another creature appears and stabs you in the back (Rogue ending his Invisibility). Would you suspect that the spellcaster summoned a creature or illusion? Would you have them spend an action for Perception to check whether it's an illusion?

Because I get the feeling that people do a lot of metagaming here when it comes to spellcasting.

Similarly, I do not think that Subtle spell makes a difference to those people, because they'd just argue that obviously suspicious behavior from their ally makes them think mental magic is involved, regardless of not having seen a spell being cast previously. They'll probably say something like "They might not know the specific spell, and they might not know how it works, but the sequence of: spellcaster seemingly does nothing for a round, nothing seems to happen, then an ally runs away for no reason would strongly indicate mental magic was being used."

Charm is subtle, however. Book art depicts all non-subtle, non-illusion spells as having a clear effect. Are you suggesting that you could cast daze at someone, and no one would connect it? Or Fear? Charitable Urge doesn't have any such text suggesting the target is unaware of what you've done.

At first you were simply wrong, but instead of accepting that you made a mistake and correcting yourself, you choose to instead dig yourself in on that mistake and start going with such obvious and nonsensical falsehoods?

I guess in your homebrew rules there's no need for Detect Magic, Magic Sense, or anything of that sort: everyone is always able to simply notice all spell effects right upon seeing them - whether it's a shapeshifted Druid, a target of Inveigle, or the victim of a Possession! \o/

But in the Pathfinder 2e rules it's clear: unless a spell has obvious effects (e.g. Fireball) or you identify the spell (e.g. quick recognition), you will simply have no idea what that spellcaster did. There's no aura of golden light radiating from the caster of Bless, nor some purple shroud around the victims of a Fear spell. Was that spell just now Bless, Bane, Benediction, Malediction, Fear, Wave of Despair, ...? You don't know. All you realize is that your team is suddenly struggling more at fighting the enemy team.

Is it in the rules to speak with the Controlled enemy (whether a free action or even have to spend 1 action to talk) and say something like "This one is the traitor in our ranks!" as it charges its ally to cause further chaos.

It depends a bit on the controlling effect. If the controlling effect only gives you control of a set number of actions, then you cannot use free actions like that - though you can spend a normal action to speak of course.

However, you're super lucky that You're Mine gives you control for 1 round, for this means you can also use the enemy's free actions and even reactions!

And yes, you can pass them drugs and have them drink them.
If it's an enemy with weapons, toss them away. Monsters usually have all statistics integrated into their statblocks, but depending on how your table runs things you could debuff an enemy's unarmed attacks by casting a 1st-rank Runic Body on them ("All its unarmed attacks become +1 striking unarmed attacks"), which should weaken their attacks significantly.

Delaying the controlled enemy's turn is possible but doesn't make much sense (they immediately get their Will save and could then potentially return to initiative), but taking a Reactive Strike against another enemy is super fun!

If it's an enemy spellcaster (occult or divine), hand them a scroll of Silence (2nd rank) and have them cast it on themselves - as the spell cannot be dismissed!

The Total Package wrote:

Is it in the rules to speak with the Controlled enemy (whether a free action or even have to spend 1 action to talk) and say something like "This one is the traitor in our ranks!" as it charges its ally to cause further chaos.

Again, your effect is not subtle, and mind control is a known thing. As a DM, that's the start of the iceberg of reasons this wouldn't work.

You're completely wrong here. This is not what the Subtle trait does.

The Subtle trait merely hides all of your spell's incantations and manifestations, which basically means two things:
1) casting a subtle spell does not break stealth,
2) this spell cannot be identified by others.

Spells without the Subtle trait can potentially be identified, but this requires that person to spend actions to do so. Primarily, enemies would need to have the Recognize Spell feat to identify the spell as a reaction; if they have a form of magic detection AND are master or higher in Occultism then they can also use Quick Identification on their turn and spend 3 actions [1 action for legendary Occultism] to identify the spell against a DC 33 [Rank 7 spell, +2 for uncommon] - anything below master takes too long for combat.

The spell also has no obvious visual effects (like an exploding fireball or vines appearing all around), so while everybody knows the sorcerer is casting a spell, they have no idea what the spell does, nor who/what the target of the spell was - whether the target itself knows is up to the GM, e.g. by using the Charm spell as guideline:

Critical Success The target is unaffected and aware you tried to charm it.

Success The target is unaffected but thinks your spell was something harmless instead of charm, unless it identifies the spell.

If the controlled enemy does something odd, then other enemies can spend actions to Sense Motive to detect the magic control. But otherwise, while people know mind control exists, if they cannot quickly identify the spell, then they have no idea that their ally is currently controlled.

That's a cool guide!

In general, I would recommend to switch the ratings towards the different versions of the spellheart, e.g. don't rate the spellheart itself but the base/greater/major version. For example, the base Jolt Coil is the best spellheart around its level but the higher-level versions are less useful because of the static DC and it giving less resistance than other spellhearts.

As for the ratings themselves:

You underrated the Jolt Coil, as its base version is definitely the best spellheart (around its level), as Electric Arc is the best damage cantrip and electricity resistance is fairly useful.

The Foxglove Token is also critically underrated, as there is no other way to get poison resistance that easily - you can always get energy-resistant runes for your armor against fire/acid/cold/electricity damage, but poison resistance is super hard to get and poison is fairly often encountered, especially as it reduces all persistent poison damage.

The same is true for the Heartmoss: mental resistance is hard to get, but also a more rare damage type compared to poison.

The Perfect Droplet is very campaign dependent, as its resistance is to the water trait, not any specific damage type. In an aquatic campaign this might be valued as if it were hardness.

Same for the Polished Demon Horn: in anti-demon/anti-devil/anti-undead campaigns the resistance to unholy triggers very often.

The Warding Statuette seems very overrated imo, as you have both the issue of fixed spell attack and spell attacks being weak in general; in other words, you never really hit with the spells and thus never get the bonus AC.

The ratings of the cantrips should probably be based on Gortle's Spell Guide, as Puff of Poison is much worse than Scatter Scree - an AoE cantrip that you can use against swarms for example.

The save bonuses in general can be disregarded, as people usually get a resilient armor rune as soon as they can, at least before getting a spellheart if possible, and the item bonuses don't stack.

For that reason some of the spellhearts, like Jyoti's Feather would have a lower rating as far as I'm concerned.

I used Warping Pull yesterday to get our Exemplar out of a very bad situation: He got hit, grabbed, and swallowed whole by a monster. Since the initial damage was low I didn't react to the hit - and couldn't react to the grab - but fortunately Swallow Whole is a damaging effect! The 10ft teleportation saved him and also ended the grab. Can very much recommend this (purple?) spell!

p.s.: I don't think Warping Pull works once you have already been swallowed whole, but only on the initial Swallow Whole attack action.

There really isn't anything afaik in terms of items, though some rare effects can work on them, like all things Harrow (suit of Crowns).:
- the Harrowing ritual
- the Harrower archetype omen
- the Harrow Sorcerer's advanced & greater bloodline spells.

Assurance suffers from there being no reliable DC modifiers.

Lore skills are the only ones with a reliable DC modifier, but they're so specific that they're not worth investing skill feats into during normal campaigns. You'd need a special campaign like Spore Wars where Additional Lore (Demons) + Assurance + Automatic Knowledge pays off.

One other thing about Oracle spells is that spells granted by your mystery
A: are not explicitly added to your tradition list, which means you cannot add them to your repertoire at a higher level (though making them signature spells still work); and
B: are able to be retrained. Other classes have specific language that prohibits retraining granted spells, like the Sorcerer saying you can't swap bloodline spells, but the Oracle does not.

I assume these are other errors that crept in when they added mystery granted spells during the Remaster, as "A" was not an issue for the Premaster cantrips at all and "B" mattered very little.

Dancing Shield is basically a shield for someone else - that will be useful in dungeons.

It's a straight downgrade from the previous Dancing Shield spell, as the previous version had also the niche ability to steal someone else's shield, but now the touched shield has to be "unattended or in your possession".

Yes it looks pretty good. Almost full Fear value (critical success is a little different and targetting is different) plus reasonable sonic damage. Thanks, I hadn't noticed Shining Kingdoms was on AON.

Please also note that Eagle's Cry does not only work on swarms (since AoEs work on swarm mind) but it outright lacks the mental trait and thus works on mindless creatures as well!

But your other option relies on dubious rules adjudication that is not going to be consistent across all tables. I think it is completely relevant to bring that up. That is something important for people wanting to follow this advice to know about.

And if you then try to push back and argue that the rules are not ambiguous and will be consistent across all tables, then expect me to respond to that.

My other option merely says that you can get holy/unholy strikes for your monk without an 11th-level Holy rune on your handwraps. That it triggers both weaknesses is just the cherry on top.

You're still hijacking this thread for another tangential topic, that has absolutely no bearing on gaining either A) reach or B) holy/unholy unarmed strikes – i.e. which this thread is about.

This is not the rules forum. Go make your own thread to complain about Mark Seifter's "dubious" explanation.

This isn't really the topic of this thread...

Cold Iron and Holy are two separate effects that both trigger their respective weaknesses. It's how Mark Seifter described it and it's also how it's implemented in Foundry VTT.

Morphic Strike

You can lash out with a portion of your previous self. You gain a melee unarmed Strike depending on your heritage, described below. You can use this unarmed Strike in either your humanoid form or your yaoguai form. These Strikes are in the brawling group. Like other unarmed attacks, you can improve this attack with handwraps of mighty blows.

• Animal [one-action] claw (agile, finesse), Damage 1d6 slashing
  
• Celestial [one-action] spirit touch (magical, sanctified, spirit), Damage 1d4 spirit
  
• Elements [one-action] elemental current (magical), Damage 1d4; this ability deals the same damage type and gains the same elemental traits of the cantrip you gained from your heritage
  
• Object [one-action] striking surface (sweep), Damage 1d8 bludgeoning or slashing (chosen when you gain this feat)
  
• Vegetation [one-action] root (reach), Damage 1d6 bludgeoning

This is a 1st-level ancestry feat and amazing for Monks (and others)!

The Vegetation option gives you a reach unarmed strike, so no more monastic weaponry needed for reach monks!

And the Celestial option is a bit low on the damage side, but borderline overpowered in campaigns where spirit damage evades all the issues with enemy resistances, like in Abomination Vaults. Meanwhile the sanctification means you can just nab a cheap Faith Tattoo and have all your strikes be (un)holy; and since monks get free cold iron on their unarmed attacks too, this triggers two weaknesses on all demons – perfect for campaigns like Spore Wars!

The entire living/undead distinction for targeting & healing/damaging effects in the 2e rules is a completely unnecessary pain in the behind.

Paizo could have just scuttled it altogether and kept Undead as a mere creature type like Dragon or Animal, while running the vitality/void healing independent of the undead trait.

Right now, if you're an undead character with the Nudge the Scales feat, you can become immune to pretty much all vitality & void damage simultaneously: immune to vitality because you have vitality healing, and immune to void damage because most void damage effects specify that they only target living creatures (e.g. Void Warp) or harm living creatures (e.g. Devouring Void).

It's needlessly complicated. Just remove all "undead" & "living" from all spells and effects and run it purely on damage/healing type.

specially after Moondrift Memories burned a lot of people.

That was not an official project backed by Paizo. This one is.

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Zoken44 wrote:

You could take a look at what Paizo did with the Rune Lord Archetype. They were also based on 7 of the 8 schools, and with the deletion of them, they shifted the delineation to the function of the spells without actually naming the schools.

What book are Rune Lord Archetypes in, please?

Rival Academies

But by the troll ruling of Strict RAW, when you take Greater Crossblooded Evolution at level 18 and choose Fear as your bloodline Sorcerous Gift spell to add, it would be added to repertoire at Rank 9 because that is the highest Rank of spell you can cast and is also a Rank that it can be heightened to. And unless you choose it as your 9th Rank Signature Spell, then you can't use lower Rank spell slots to cast it with.

There's nothing stopping you from also normally adding Fear to your repertoire as a 3rd-rank spell and it would still get the bloodmagic effect.

I'm playing an Oracle in a 2e remastered game and I want to take the Mummy Archetype. Question is: Would that automatically make my good character unholy?

The others have already answered that question, but to expand it a little:

As a Mummy Oracle you can even
a) become Holy by getting a Faith Tattoo and have a deity that allows Holy sanctification;
b) get Vitality healing from Nudge the Scales as if you were a living creature.

Charisma is generally about personality, from reading the room to knowing which buttons to push to elicit desired reactions.

In terms of Recall Knowledge you could ask your GM to allow you to use CHA-based skills for asking about the strategies (& special abilities) of enemies, e.g. RK with Deception reveals whether an enemy uses sneak attacks, feints, precision weapons, or has special bonuses on attacking off-guard targets. RK Intimidation might work on the combat styles of STR-focused combatants – i.e. impressive greatsword-swingers and in general the kind of martials who look like they embody Intimidating Prowess. RK Diplomacy & Performance can give you information about leader & support type combatants – whether it's from your knowledge about organizing a team or leading a choir, you recognize those skills in others.

CHA-based skills could also be used to judge what kind of spells an enemy spellcaster might utilize, probably Diplomacy for support/divine casters [divine magic is about petitioning/negotiating with deities], Deception for debuff/occult casters [debuff/occult is about influencing the mind of opponents], Intimidation for offensive/primal casters [offense/primal is about raw power – "force of nature"], and Performance for all-rounders & others/arcane casters [jack of all trades tradition].

The Thassilonian Rune Magic focus spells are all really good, except for the Sloth one ("Reclined Apport"), which is a focus-point Telekinetic Hand.

Cutting Eye is a very strong Reaction, like a focus "Interposing Earth" but also works against all spells with saves.

All-Encompassing Hunger is 1 Action for a bit of damage, though having a rank 1 (focus) spell with a death effect is unique.

Precious Gleam adds a whole lot of damage to a weapon, 1d6 per rank, and makes it silver or cold iron on top. Stacks with Runic Weapon.

Heart's Hook is really strong, with the 120 ft range and no incapacitation trait, and the fact that you can choose whom the creature has to approach (e.g. your party's Fighter or Champion).

Crescent Scepter doesn't seem like something you want to use on a Wizard... but it's probably cool on an unholy Champion.

Sloth... meh. I mean if your party uses Disarm (though I don't know many who do), you could ready the spell to immediately steal the weapon, but as a focus spell it's pretty useless.

Vengeful Glare is useful to trigger fire/cold weaknesses, being able to freely apply persistent cold or fire damage to it. With just 1 Action to cast this can be a cool thing to add spellshapes like Chaotic Spell to it!

Bluemagetim wrote:

A summon will cause indirect harm.

If you are reaching to this level of abstraction, the class will begin to have basic functionality issues.

Any aid whatsoever they lend to the party would then count as indirect harm.

That's nonsense.

Just look at it from the perspective that is already established in game:
If an action counts as a hostile action (e.g. to break Invisibility), then it should be considered active involvement. And if it causes injury, then it is doing harm.

Sure, you can summon a Fire Elemental, but once you command (sustain) it to attack someone, then that is definitely using your magic to cause harm with an element.

For at what point would that be different than casting Floating Flame? Both are temporarily summoned forms of elemental fire that require your direct command to harm others.

Envy Runelords cannot deal damage with the elements nor the void.

Careful here: the Anathema does not just prohibit damage spells, but all spells that harm someone:

Anathema: Use your magic to cause harm with the elements or void.

That can be interpreted in a wide way.

For example, I think this also includes summoning creatures that utilize offensive abilities with the elemental or void trait/damage - a Skeleton Guard should be fine, but a Wraith or Fire Elemental is forbidden.

You can make sure it's fine though if it corresponds to your sin of Envy: as long as the spell/ability is used to take away something, rather than just causing harm, you should be fine. That's why you have both Tangle Vine and Earthbind as sin spells, to take away someone's (fly) speed.

As of RoE, we have defined the elements as: Air, Earth, Fire, Metal, Water & Wood.

Yes and no.

There are several different elemental philosophies, and each philosophy differs in what are elements. For example Minkai's elemental philosophy also classifies mental and void as elements.

However, the Runelords of old were active in the Inner Sea region, which would imply the philosophy that knows only those four elements: air, earth, fire, water.

Notably, the Runelords also existed during the absence of the planes of wood & metal, which would further corroborate the idea that neither wood nor metal are part of their elemental anathema.

Rank 2 — Divine, Occult

2 Actions — RARE, Concentrate, Holy, Manipulate

Area 30-foot emanation

Duration sustained for up to 1 minute

You perform a dance that seeks to pass on the knowledge and wisdom of a naga. Your allies in the area are filled with sacred energy, making their spells and attacks holy. Creatures or effects that would be unholy don't gain this benefit.

When you cast or Sustain this spell, you can choose an ally in the area that's Grabbed, Immobilized, or Restrained. They can immediately use a reaction to Escape; they can use your Occultism or Religion modifier for the check instead of their unarmed attack, Acrobatics, or Athletics modifier if that would be better.

Is it intentional that this spell doesn't make your own spells & attacks holy, since you don't count as your own ally?

At first this looked like a way to finally get some (at least temporary) holy/sanctification going on non-Cleric divine casters, but no... .

It seems weird to me that you can cast this holy spell to infuse everyone, except yourself. Maybe rephrase it to "Creatures of your choice in the area..." for the first part and leave only the second part of the spell for allies?

Occult spells that can still be very useful at level 10:

1: Bless, Fear, Helpful Steps, Illusory Object, Liberating Command, Lock, Loose the Path, Sanctuary, Sure Strike
2: Animus Mine, Augury, False Vitality, Humanoid Form, Illusory Object/Creature, Invisibility, Knock, Laughing Fit, Loose Time's Arrow, Mind Games, Mirror Image, Revealing Light

Going beyond the exact RaW, it is not spelled out if the 20ft burst is "Surface only" or if it's a dome of effect. I presume most GMs rule that it's surface only, and a creature airborne > 5ft off the ground will not be affected.

The spell makes no mention of ground, surfaces or anything. I'm reading it as the slithering snakes to come from a globe of shadow and can thus be used in mid-air (spherical). I personally prefer that to make it more distinct from the Black Tentacles spell and to have a rank-appropriate effect against fliers.

Generalize the OP's suggestion for Flash of Grandeur:

Reactions with a duration need some overhaul in general, as durations of "1 round" technically end on the beginning of the user's turn instead of lasting for "1 round".
This also includes reaction abilities with similar phrasing (e.g. "until beginning/end of your turn"), which is too often prohibitively short, e.g. a support witch using Portents of the Haruspex when an ally kills an enemy, only to have your turn start immediately after without ever giving any ally the chance to make use of it.

These rules/abilities should instead be made to last 1 actual round (i.e. tick down on the initiative they were used on, not the completely unrelated initiative of the user).

How does Dragon play as a blaster? The starting focus spell d8+d4 per rank on two targets seems like a decent blaster build opening shot, but I've never tried it.

Dragon is a very good blaster caster, and even better than Elemental below level 10.

The Elemental bloodline suffers a lot from its blasting focus spell only coming on at level 10; before level 10 you only have Elemental Toss, which is a great 3rd action, but not a main blast. Meanwhile the Draconic bloodline has better damage on its Flurry of Claws right from 1st level and gets the Dragon Breath at level 6.

The Draconic bloodline is also extremely versatile in that it can choose any spell-list and even has different damage type options for its Draconic Breath. So if your campaign ends at level 11, I would honestly recommend Draconic over Elemental. If your campaign goes/starts at 10+, then Elemental is stronger since the blasting focus spell is so versatile (choose cone/line/burst each time you cast it).

In regard to the Draconic bloodline, I think it's also extremely important to mention that you are not limited to the Draconic Exemplars given in Player Core 2, as PC2 explicitly states that you can take other Draconic Exemplars and build them with your GM. From my experience every GM out there allows you to switch to the damage types listed in Paizo's PFS Organized Play section which you can find over at this link. The rules also state that you can then fill the 2nd-, 5th-, and 8th-rank bonus spells with a spell from that draconic exemplar's family spellcasting entry.

For example, I'm playing an Umbral Dragon Sorcerer in a Gatewalkers campaign (will continue with Spore Wars), and the GM allowed me to use void damage (instead of fire) on my Flurry of Claws and Dragon Breath. As the bonus spells I chose from the Umbral Dragon spellcasters entry the spells (2) Humanoid Form, (5) Shadow Siphon, and (8) Disappearance; apart from the 2nd-rank spell these are amazing additions to the primal spell-list, where you worry more about having the spells rather than triggering the blood magic effect tbh.

So depending on the campaign it can be quite worthwhile to choose certain damage types for your Dragon blaster. Especially noteworthy are those dragons that combine a spell-list with an atypical damage type or that offer you an atypical/rare saving throw against the Dragon Breath focus spell.

Typical means something like getting mental damage on an occult spellcaster or a Reflex save blast on fire/cold/acid/... ("primal") damage. But Poison & Fort saves are atypical for occult casters, as is void damage vs a Reflex save, or early Will save AoE spells. Thus the most noteworthy dragons are, in my opinion, the Sky Dragon (divine tradition + electricity damage), the Mirage Dragon (arcane tradition + Dragon Breath vs Will save), the Umbral Dragon (primal tradition + void damage vs Reflex), and the Conspirator Dragon (occult tradition + Dragon Breath vs Fortitude).

Finally, it also depends on your variant rules. If you have Free Archetype and go into the Flames Oracle to get Whirling Flames, then the Elemental bloodline focus spell doesn't do much for you anymore, as Whirling Flames already offer a unique and amazing versatility in the positioning of the blasts. In this case I would recommend the Draconic or Imperial bloodline as well, since you want to have arcane spellcasting if you go for a divine spellcasting archetype already.

I'm playing an arcane Dragon + FA: Flames Oracle blaster in Prey for Death atm, and it's a blast. With the Dragon Claws, the Dragon Breath & the Whirling Flames, I have all the versatility in blasting I need from focus spells, use my spell-slots for other blasts, and apply Foretell Harm to up the damage (especially when you hit someone's weakness).

Btw, at levels 11+ you might want to choose utility cantrips over the usual blasting cantrips, as you can a) afford cheap Spellhearts to get blasty cantrips, and b) have enough spell-slots to no longer need to blast with cantrips. For example Message & Tremor Signs for stealth communication, Tangle Vine as free rope, Prestidigidation to clean things up quickly, Eat Fire for defense, Detect Metal to help find hidden doors/traps/items, but most importantly Deep Breath as air poisons and suffocation are bigger threats than at low levels.

As an example, in the aforementioned Prey for Death campaign I had my Sorceress voluntarily engulf herself into the huge fire elemental as she took hardly any damage from being engulfed (high fire resistance), had no need to breathe (Deep Breath), had greater cover against the other enemies, and was also safe from being hit with the elemental's bludgeoning attacks, while the elemental was constantly offguard to her spell attacks; surpassing the Rupture value allows you to escape, but RAW you don't have to. :D

I agree with the others, though would add a little to that specific level range:

The Free Archetype for a Flames Oracle would get you the wonderful Whirling Flames focus spell as well as the Foretell Harm cursebound ability, adding even more damage with rechargeable resources. The Whirling Flames also help you with a problem most non-divine blasters have, which is targeting enemies with AoE's without hitting your allies, as placing a few 5-ft-bursts is easier than placing a big burst, so this focus spell is good for following rounds once melee has begun.

For Crossblooded Evolution I recommend the Psychopomp bloodline, since nothing is really resistant to both vitality & void damage (except constructs), and it's great for triggering weaknesses, as most Sorcerers have trouble getting both vitality & void damage blasts.

Some other choices depending on the campaign and the rest of the party.

For example, if you have a party member who can reliably tell you which weaknesses enemies have, you should absolutely go with the Sorcerer's Energy Fusion feat; this lets you utilize your low-level spell-slots to boost your damage even further and change half the damage to the type triggering the weakness. Thunderstrike and Swallow Light are very low level spells that cover 4 damage types already: electricity, sonic, cold, void.

And if your campaign has very long adventuring days, with 5+ encounters per day (in some dungeon crawls), I can recommend the Wellspring Mage archetype for the Sorcerer (& Oracle).

I'd like to see a universal black blade archetype, one that can be taken by people who aren't arcane casters. (Or failing that, one that's simply available for characters in PF2E.)

I'd like to see a Gunslinger archetype that works with non-arcane casters, like Kurumi Tokisaki: Gunslinger + Time Oracle.

PFS is a real-life Westmarches server.

Yes but the gifted power slot is only for your mystery granted spells, your divine access spells, and the spell you can grab from mysterious repertoire. The two extra slots from divine effusion can be whatever though.

There are some really good options among applicable deities for some (most?) mysteries. I admit I'll never bothered with a Battle, Ancestors, or Blight Oracle due to their bad curses; Life & Bones are so flavorful and I'd love to play them more often, but it hurts that their curses are... well, others talked about that already.

I took Kerkamoth on one of my Cosmos Oracles, so I could get Disintegrate right when 6th-rank spells came online; the Shadow Siphon spell is also amazing and you don't even need to make Shadow Siphon a signature spell if you have Gifted Power.

The divine spell list is actually very rich at higher levels, even for offense, but still, taking Synesthesia on a Lore Oracle from Narriseminek is very flavorful and effective; Confusion I haven't used much, but with Gifted Power it's a good choice for that eventual 8th rank slot.

For reasons others have pointed out, the Cosmos mystery was the best one to play, but lately I've switched my favorite mystery over to Time. As long as you're careful to avoid enemy reactions you can deal with the curse. I feel this is much better than the Cosmos curse, which never really mattered; the Time curse requires you to be very mindful of it, which makes it much more present at all times for me as a player and that increases the fun.

Now if only there were a Spellshot archetype for Oracles so I can play Kurumi Tokisaki...

p.s.: If you can, convince your GM to give you Time Jump instead of Time Pocket as your 3rd-rank mystery gifted spell; the latter reigns supreme upon the heap of garbage spells (unless you play some kind of Thief Oracle but don't have Trickery/Stealth?), while the former is one you'd literally kill for as a Time-cursed Oracle. I don't understand for one second why Paizo made this choice.

How exactly does the Lore Oracle's revelation spell Brain Drain work at the table (or VTT)?

After the enemy failed their Will save and you get your chance to RK:

You probe the target's mind to glean knowledge. This deals 1d8 mental damage with a basic Will save. If the target fails the save, you sort through the stolen memories to attempt a single check to Recall Knowledge. Choose a skill that has the Recall Knowledge action, and use the target's skill modifier for the check.

The first major issue is: You don't even know which skills the target is untrained/trained/exp/mas/leg in, or is the GM supposed to tell the player that? Because not knowing the modifier you roll with, in fact not even knowing the Lore skill options the target has, really makes this borderline unusable.

Example: You successfully brain-drain a car expert [Legendary in these Lores: "Sports Cars", "Race Cars", "Luxury Cars", "Historic Cars", "Modern Cars"] and you ask the GM to roll RK with "Lore: Cars" because you expect him to have that, and the GM then rolls with a +0 modifier [because untrained in "Lore: Cars"]... seems RAW how it should be done but also too bad to be true.

The second major issue is: Which skills do you roll if you want to access a target's very individual knowledge: Where are the traps in your headquarters? What's the secret passphrase to enter the crypt? What are the plans of your BBEG boss?

The victim most likely knows the answers to these questions (maybe partially, GM decision), but which skill can be used to access this information? Especially considering that the target might not be trained in a single RK skill.

Or, even more trivial things: What's your name? Where do you live? Who are your friends? What's your favorite food? The target definitely knows these things, but they might not be trained in Society at all [assuming they're a Humanoid]. So as per RAW it would basically be impossible for a target to even access that information.

Example: Would a Baomal be able to know that it can swim or breathe underwater? It's a level 20 aberration, not trained in Occultism nor any applicable Lore, and has an INT modifier of -3. It would fail a RK check on that question 15% of the time, even if the GM were to set a DC of 1.

tl;dr

How should this spell be interpreted and how would it be used at the table, step-by-step?

For RAI purposes, if it's applicable even, here's the Pf1e Lore Oracle's Brain Drain revelation:

Brain Drain (Su): You can take a standard action to violently probe the mind of a single intelligent enemy within 100 feet. The target receives a Will save to negate the effect and immediately knows the source of this harmful mental prying. Those who fail this save are wracked with pain, taking 1d4 points of damage per oracle level. After successfully attacking with this ability, you may use a fullround action to sort through the jumble of stolen thoughts and memories to make a single Knowledge check using the victim’s skill bonus. The randomly stolen thoughts remain in your mind for a number of rounds equal to your Charisma modifier. Treat the knowledge gained as if you used detect thoughts. This is a mind-affecting effect. You can use this ability once per day at 1st level, plus one additional time per day at 5th level and for every 5 levels beyond 5th.

I'd actually recommend Yaoguai over Automaton, as they can be objects as well and they can change shape which Boxxo does a lot too.

Basic Face Mask - rarely useful but super cheap

Scorpion Whip - same as Whip, but less bulk (L instead of 1), not nonlethal

Folding Ladder - same as Ladder, but a lot less bulk

Clothing (Desert & Cold Weather) - rarely useful but indispensable in some areas

Elixir of Life - 25% cheaper than Healing Potion, gets the job (bringing someone back up) done, also has a nice bonus if someone was brought down by poison

Crowbar, Ten Foot Pole, Climbing Kit & Writing Set - every party needs 1

Scroll Robes - little bit more expensive than Explorer's Clothing, but can be inscribed with a reaction spell (e.g. Gentle Landing)

Kilted Breastplate - Light Armor, strictly superior to Studded Leather

(Spiked) Gauntlet - indispensable if you play a Ghost, so you can open doors et.al.!

The rules say that an action is hostile if the actor knows that it could cause harm. He doesn't have to suspect it to cause harm.

Otherwise the dumber your character is, the more hostility he can get away with: Just dump INT/WIS, roll an applicable check before AoE Heal and say "I didn't know that skeleton would take damage from the spell." (failed your Religion / Undead Lore check)

Heal is used to cause harm 50% of the time (roughly speaking), so anyone casting it knows that it could cause harm.

I'm pretty sure that a spellcaster knows very well that the Heal spell could cause harm. There is neither ignorance nor unawareness at play here. Just like you can't walk around the marketplace casting Vitality Lash on everyone, thinking everyone here is a living creature has vitality healing, declaring it a non-hostile action.

The change to Whispers of the Void to target any creature shows another way that this problem could be resolved. Simply don't have spells change their targeting based on undead/living status.

Even Heal and Harm could work under that design. Heal would just do both Vitality damage and Vitality healing to any target. Same with Harm doing both Void damage and Void healing to all of its targets. Let the Void Healing rules and the Damage Type rules sort out which of the two gets ignored and which has an effect.

While I do agree in principle, I would have to caution here that casting Heal to heal someone would then be a hostile action, due to dealing vitality damage, even if they are immune. Same with Harm.

"nerf into oblivion" is an odd way to describe a change that doesn't change the primary effect of the ability at all. For a character that only Sure Strikes occasionally (most likely a pure caster) it might not alter how they use the spell at all.

I've been playing many full casters, and I tell you this ruins a lot of spells for me that require Sure Strike. It's true that you only cast Sure Strike occasionally, heck, I'd even say that you only cast it rarely as a full caster, but when those rare occasions come up you are likely to cast it more than once during the encounter.

Sure Strike was the only way of making AC targeting spells worth taking. Now they're to avoid like the plague.

In order to avoid non-pure casters spamming that spell they ruined it for everyone, despite claiming they want abilities to work for the intended classes. So I still maintain that this change sucks hard and that my solution "Sure Strike works only for spell attack rolls" is much better, as it stops the spam without hurting full casters.

It is only considered a nerf if you were thinking that the ruling was that the dedication alone was sufficient.

Well, that's what I was thinking because Logan Bonner said so.

(This might be the thing that Red Griffyn was referring to.)

Matthew Jaluvka wrote:

the errata finally loaded for me and I think the live wire nerf is actually more impactful than the sure strike nerf

We all knew that was coming, right? It was clearly way out of line. That one was a "enjoy the party while it lasts" situation.

But now the spell is entirely useless, because it's strictly inferior to Electric Arc.

EA rank 1: 2d4 vs 2 targets basic Reflex
LW rank 1: 2d4 vs 1 target "basic AC"

EA rank 2: 3d4
LW rank 2: 2d4

EA rank 3: 4d4
LW rank 3: 4d4

EA rank 4: 5d4
LW rank 4: 4d4

Scales worse than Electric Arc even on a single target, i.e. EA now does more than double damage of Live Wire.

And the persistent damage can safely be ignored because casters never crit with attack rolls anyway. So where's the point in Live Wire now?