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Secret Page
School transmutation; Level bard 3, sorcerer/wizard 3

Casting Time 10 minutes
Components V, S, M (powdered herring scales and will-o’-wisp essence)

Range touch
Target page touched, up to 3 sq. ft. in size
Duration permanent
Saving Throw none; Spell Resistance no

Secret page alters the contents of a page so that it appears to be something entirely different. The text of a spell can be changed to show even another spell. Explosive runes or sepia snake sigil can be cast upon the secret page.
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The first paragraph of the description can use some clarity in the effect.

I recommend adding to the first sentence "...or blank." Although it is reasonable to assume that this is possible from the spell description, it is not clear.

After the second sentence, I recommend adding a new sentence: "Secret page cannot be used to scribe a spell that is not known by the caster." Alternately, if secret page can scribe new spells, it should read: "Secret Page can be used to scribe a spell which has been deciphered by the caster."

Per RAW, an autoreset trap of Magic Circle against Evil costs 11,500 gp for a CL 12 effect, to anyone who walks over it. This allows armies to walk around with the buff whenever they choose to. The same can be done with Greater Magic Weapon.

An autoreset trap of cure light wounds, at 2500 gp, will provide infinite healing.

Setting a finite limit to magical traps is someone necessary, as otherwise, every wizard tower or clerical church with sufficient time and funds will have infinite casting of spells at whatever caster level they choose to have them. Magical traps, when used for buffing, can be the most cost efficient magical items in the game.

Planar Binding, even the much maligned planar binding of efreet, is a canonical effect that should remain a part of the game. In order to have fantasy roleplaying, it is almost an assumption that wizards will bind powerful elementals and demons to do the mage's bidding.

However, the big problem is that the Planar Binding spells and effects use as an attempt to balance them the hit die of the target creature. Unfortunately, as proven by the Polymorph subschool patch, Hit Die are a notoriously poor balancing metric, as different outsiders of a given Hit Die can have a wide difference in spell like abilities.

On the one hand, applying a similar patch to Planar Binding as was used with Polymorph could result in a clean balancing of the spell, it robs the spell of a lot of its flavor, as essentially you couldn't bind, say, a Bestiary standard Efreet, but rather a Fire type outsider with x, y, and z special abilities.

So, how do you then go about establishing a method for functionality of this spell that doesn't result in infinite money loops with at will or per day spell like abilities?

First of all, I would like to point out that I am presenting this from a position where I have, at many points in my adult life, been paid in a professional capacity for performance. The current Performance skill is a simplified mechanic which is currently insufficient, in my opinion, to model the actual use of the skill in the real world, let alone at the legendary scale provided by the PFRPG ruleset. I will attempt, however, to not base my argument on authority, because I feel it stands well independantly.

The current performance rules only model the most basic of performance interactions, the busk. For those who are not familiar with the term, busking is when you stand on a street corner, perform, and hope people put some change in your hat. While this is certainly a portion of what performance is about, I think the mechanical effects of basic performance, even when not enhanced by bardic talent, should be able to do more.

First, I think Performance should allow for an intersection with community size. Although community size rules, from the DMG, are not OGL, I would like a DC for Perform scaled to the size of community you are trying to busk and influence. Busking a village sized portion of a metropolis nets you a bonus to Diplomacy of +2, +1 for every 5 you exceeded the DC of the community size for members of that community, and a reward based on the community size + whatever for every +5 over the amount you exceeded the DC. Busking the entire metropolis should have a very high DC of 45 to 50 or more, and a corresponding reward in money. This would be the equivalent of performing for a Emperor and his entire court and retainers, and should be very difficult to get them to fork over cash and treat you with respect.

Ergo:

Busk a Hamlet: DC 10 3d6 sp + 1d6 sp per +5
Busk a Village: DC 15 1d4 gp + 2d6 sp per +5
etc.
Diplomacy bonuses would extend to every member of that community, and a successful Perform check should be able carry a Diplomacy rider, to enable the perform to influence attitude through the performance. I do not think that Intimidate is appropriate as a mechanical rider to a perform check, even if the performance is some kind of martial demonstration, as I feel the context and use of perform is not appropriate for that.

Metropolii, by their very nature, have various neighborhoods, so to busk the Docks, or the Noble District, you would need to only beat the DC to busk a village or town, rather than performing well enough to gain a bonus with everybody in the city.

Bonuses should be able to be gained through tools, like mastercrafted compositions, and instruments, and Aid Another checks should be common and necessary to reach the upper DCs.

In Alpha 3, Wind Stance was stated to give concealment and a general 20% miss chance.

In the Beta, Wind Stance still gives concealment, but provides a 20% miss chance against ranged attacks only.

While it does allow stealth oriented characters to pick up an option to access something similar to Hide in Plain Sight with anything more than 5 ft of movement, under both versions, the Beta version has been significantly reduced from the Alpha version for full BAB characters, who are amongst the most likely to wade into melee.

Mechanically, I thought the alpha version was somewhat cleaner, as concealment is concealment, and having concealment only provide an effect (20% miss chance) some of the time seems odd to me.

With regard to the power level, with the BAB +6 prerequisite, it will become available for medium BAB classes at level 8, where, for some of them, blur, the nearest comparable effect, has been available since level 4. Full BAB classes will likely not take it at or near level 6, since their feat selections will likely be dedicated to building effectiveness in one of a handful of combat resolving feat trees, rather than defensive boosting trees.

I would like the feat, therefore, to be returned to Alpha levels, so that it again comes closer to the functionality of blur. The counter problems of requiring the commitment of move actions and having a 1 round duration compensate for at will usage, and slightly easier activation.

As a fork from the AC = Video Game Defense thread, I'd like to open a new thread to discuss the behaviour of animal and near animal intelligence mosters.

There is some debate within the thread as to prey selection methods for magical predators. Specifically, the hydra, who is relatively insulated from all but the most determined of foes who are dedicated to assaulting the hydra with physical force, with fast healing and the ability to sprout additional heads. While some think that this consumes some resource of the hydra, there is nothing within the description of the hydra or statistics which make this likely. Therefore, there is some debate as to what a hydra would consider a valid threat.

Although it is the opinion of some that the hydra, and similar magical predators, would naturally select amongst opponents based on apparent frailty, there are compelling Earth analogues that would indicate that the monster would attack based on territorial selection (i.e. closest opponent within the hydra's perceived territorial or ambush zone, like a hippo or crocodile). Perhaps it might be a good idea to discuss monster behaviours which we might like to see codified within the Bestiary for animals and animal-like creatures.

Additionally, there was another thread where a CR15 monster, one of the Inevitables, was discussed as a melee opponent. As this particular opponent also has fast healing, and is an intelligent outsider, there was some debate as to the construct's actual behaviour in a melee fight. Eventually, it was resolved that dimension door away to fast heal back to full would be a valid response to a melee threat. But it would be nice to see some discussion within the bestiary of how certain special abilities make monsters behave in general.

The rules specifically indicate, as presently written, that the monk's unarmed attack is considered to be either a weapon or a natural weapon, for effects which depend on type.

I am firmly convinced that this is a mistake, because it generates multiple rule anomalies. Specifically, for those creatures who are considered to have Natural Weapon sequences. What happens to a True Dragon who takes class levels in Monk? How about a centaur? Or even Half Dragon? What makes all of these options complex for a Monk is that they all have secondary natural weapons, so may end up with Unarmed Attack sequence/Secondary Natural Weapon sequence. How would this impact those classes which have the ability to gain natural weapons who multiclass to monk, like bloodline sorcerors?

While technically this may be an issue with the working of the improved unarmed attack feat, the unarmed attack rules are a key part of the monk class. Patching and correcting this confusion will be critical to the function of the Monk class, especially with regard to feats, like Improved Natural Weapon.

I propose that unarmed attacks be made a slam natural attack, with an exception that allows the slam attack to iterate with BAB/Flurry of Blows progression. This will limit the number of effects a monk can layer on their unarmed strike, and makes oils of align weapon useless for monks, but I consider this a small price to pay for rules logic and consistency. Besides, the monk already has access to weapons when necessary. I know I have played many monks who have used the quarterstaff or kama to avoid touching hazardous enemies.