Timothy Bean's page

I know its probably going to fall on deaf ears, but please, let this thing die. If specific issues come up in future game sessions that are relevant to the topic, hey, that's great, bring it up. But its really pointless to keep restating the same opinion, again and again, more emphatically, because all its doing is generating more and more ill will and...

Well said. I haven't played anything but a cleric in fullplate for the last 10 years. But I respect the design team who put PRPG together enough to see how the rules are in practice before burning my character sheets in protest.

Tim

P.S. - This is what house rules are for.

Is there a general traits list available on Paizo's boards anywhere? I would like to review what the current set of options are, but have only seen the traits from the "Elves" book. I think there is an expanded list in the "Second Darkness" companion, but only 1 of 6 in my group has it, leaving me unable to get a concensus opnion. Thanks!

In our games, everyone is usually Human, Elf, or Halfling.. with the occasional Half-Orc, or some other non-core race. Nobody wants to be the Gnome or Dwarf.

I have the same type of group, and we have been gaming together for 15 years now. If left to their own devices we normally end up with 2 or 3 elves and a human. If I am playing and not DM i always play a dwarf. Know how I fixed it? I just finished DMing an all dwarven campaign, no other races allowed for the PC's. Really gave them a different look at the race and different character concepts to be played within in. And the dwarven rouge in the party is a trap finding beast. Not a tumbly, sissy "oh no I have to cartwheel away now" kind of rouge. Very cool.

Long Live Dwarves!

BTW, we have forbidden Gnomes in all games forever, because we had a bad player play a bad gnome 10 years ago. I think all races can be played well without having to stereotype. But we all still remember the poorly played dwarven thief from 2E that stunk up the game everytime he opened his mouth.

T

[snip] Before judging how to improve the rules, though, it is prudent to establish the goals for a rule change:

3) To remove to some extent the certainty of the timing of death from bleeding when a character is dying and thus to increase tension in the game when a character goes down and make it a bigger priority for the rest of the party to stabilize him rather than say "yeah, we have X more rounds, let’s do something else first..." [snip]

I assume you start this thread by indicating your goals for the rule change, since there hasn't been a huge cry from the masses on this rule that I was aware of. Perhaps I missed it as I am not on the boards everyday. Having said that, I agree that there is an imbalance related to your third point, though not the same that you see, and I don't think your system addresses the real weirdness around dying.

Example: Say I have two first level fighters, Bob and Melvin, both with 10 hp each (12 point buy and they went for balance). They get into combat and Bob charges a goblin, failing to realize that the goblin had a spear set for a charge, taking double damage and being instantly reduced to -1 hp (good goblin). Melvin kills a second goblin after sustaining a decent wound (6 pts of damage) before the goblin sorcerer hits him with a magic missle, dropping poor Melvin to -1 hp.

Granted, these fighters suck, but that is not the point. Should both of them die at the same rate? Bob has a ghastly longspear wound in his gut, a physical wound that dropped him into the dying range (just for arguments sake). Melvin on the other hand took 5 points of force damage, so what is he dying of, internal bleeding? Shame? At higher levels the bizare possibilities are even greater. Take horrid wilting for example, an 8th level spell. So you lose 40 points of damage from getting rapidly dehydrated and drop into the dying range, but why do you keep dying? Your body doesn't keep losing water just for the heck of it. If you can find a way to address this in your system, I might climb onboard the bandwagon. Thanks for reading and your thoughts.

T

its an old "weapon" used in 2nd edition andpresented ina few sourcebooks

there is any chance of re-adding it?

i wouldn't mention it... but my RotR Campaign died because the DM was stubbron we did tramp in his game by using something like this when he intendted tohelpescape an NPC so he will meetus in the Thristletop with the rest of the bosses making for a much more difficult battle.

Lasso would be awesome on the weapon list. I just finished a campaign where a PC used a lasso (with rules made up on the fly) to take down two different BBEG (big bad evil guys) in climactic battles. It was very creative but not a glimmer of a rule for it. And where would Wonder Woman be without her lasso. Seriously.

We need to get away from requiring extra feats in order for multiclass spellcasters to gain more parity as spellcasters.

Try this instead.

Multiclass spellcasters can count the total of their 'full-casting' class levels with regard to damage, dispelling, duration, etc....

By 'fullcasting' I mean bards, clerics, druids, sorcerers, wizards.

'Half-caster' (paladin, ranger, etc.) and non-caster levels (barbarian, fighter, etc.) can be totalled, add half of it to the character's effective spellcasting level. Rounded down. Prestige classes that add caster levels are counted as per the PrC description.

So, a ftr 4/wiz 9 casts spells at 11th level. A clr 3/ftr 3/wiz 4 casts divine spells at 4th level, wizard spells at 5th level.

It's up to you to decide if that should also apply to what kinds of spells they can gain access to. Should do so just to make it simple.

Is there something in PF that indicates fighter or rogue or barbarian abilities come from a divine source? Or that they are learned from some mystic and arcane study? I can't imagine any similarities in training, concepts, or focus that would allow fighter and barbarian levels make a wizard a better spellcaster. "Look at me I can rage one more time per day and cast more powerful 3rd level spells!" Is it just me or does that sound so far out as to be absurd?

Allowing full casting classes to stack doesn't make sense to me because they all draw their casting from different sources. THere is a clear delineation between the sorcerer and wizard, so allowing their levels to stack kind of makes 2 classes obsolete. And what does a bark eating, tree hugging druid have in common with the bookworm wizard seeking the mysteries of ultimate power?

I've often played multi-class clerics and multi-classing is about sacrificing power in one class to gain unique or complementary power from a different class. I often take fighter levels to gain a bump to my combat abilities at the expense of casting levels. And to me this is a good sacrifice and helps balance the power of the class. If those 2 fighter levels allowed me to add another d6 to my flamestrike wouldn't spellcasters be more overpowered as so many people complain already?

There is a feat, Practiced Spellcaster, that lets you add up to +4 caster level for non-caster levels you have taken, whether Fighter, rogue, or other casting class. It only grants an improvement to caster level, but no bonus spells or powers, so what you are talking about is already allowed by a feat. Take the feat, don't look for a rules change here

IMHO only same class levels should stack or PrC that grant stackable abilities should allow you to gain power in your spellcasting. I think a rule like this would lead to MORE level dipping