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So I have to ask is this Enhanced Starfinder book going to bring the rules up to where Pathfinder 2e is as far as action economy or is this just adding details that the Core Rulebook didn't really have room for? I guess you could say maybe a re-imagining of the game or is it revamping what was already there?

I am a bit confused on Tzitzimtl's light to dark reaction. A cleric uses healing channel he uses the reaction to turn the energy to negative. Does the healing spell not heal the characters and does it cause them damage? Can someone explain because the ability is a bit vague to me. I get that it turns the positive trait to negative and I assume if they were using the heal to harm undead I would assume it would heal the undead since it is now negative.

They do not get the feat for two reasons.

1) Dwarven Weapon Proficiency only makes martial dwarf weapons simple for the purposes of determining proficiency.
2) Warhammers are not dwarf weapons, so Dwarven Weapon Proficiency does not make them simple weapons. A dwarf weapon is a weapon with the Dwarf trait, which at this point are only of the clan dagger and dwarven war axe.

And.. that was fast! Thanks I figured if anything it would be because the weapon is martial to begin with and its d8. Seems it is only there to pump d4 and d6 damage types up. But your other reasons make sense more then the fact of the weapon being martial initially be the deity. And looking back it only says you are trained in those weapons looking further down makes sense. Thank you!

So looking under the warpriest doctrine it says "If your deities weapon is simple you gain the deadly simplicity cleric feat". Now for a player who is playing a Dwarf if they take the weapon familiarity which then makes the warhammer simple does that mean they get that feat? I am assuming not since the weapon would not be considered simple initially. I am assuming that would be helpful to classes that can only use simple weapons.

I would recommend including your order number so that when they get to you it's much easier for them to look it up.

So my order says waiting on back ordered items and hasn't billed. Paizo can you please check my order to ensure the Lost Omens book doesn't hold my books up from shipping? Thank you in advance!

I apologize if this is the wrong area for this but I preordered a lot of the Pathfinder 2nd Edition books. Will preordering Lost Omen World Guide prevent me from receiving my other stuff on August 1st? In other words will it delay me from getting my Core Rule Book and other items because that book is going to be released later in August or will my stuff be shipped on August 1st? I just don't want to be anticipating my books only to find my order had been delayed because of a book being pushed back.

Why isn't Erik Mona's name on the cover?

Where is the option to remove the grids on the battle maps, flip mats ect? I play on Fantasy Grounds and I know Pathfinder had some options to turn the grids on and off but the basic starfield and many others dont and it makes it impossible to align hex maps in the program and you end up with grids not overlaying properly. Starfinder needs this option in their map packs. I'm afraid to buy anymore without this option because I wont be able to use them. Please consider adding the gridless feature to turn them on and off.

Jason,

I am not trying to beat the horse to death but what made you take the surprise round out? Also, in the bestiary it would be nice if there was a trait that showed what Recall Knowledge skill you would use when identifying certain monsters or perhaps listed in the book similarly to the first edition core rule book.

Kirk

This exactly what has boggled my mind. Using the unseen tactics and the fact that if PCs are rolling initiative then they really already assume an encounter is imminent. I have been playing D&D for 23 years and Ive played Pathfinder 1sr edition since it has been out. What is going on with surprise rounds? Can I at the least get one action off? These rules are not very clear cut and I understand that it is a playtest but why is it that the only thing in the book in the index references the Rogues Surprise attack. I can understand if only players who are aware get one action but the fact that surprise rounds are based solely off of being seen, unseen, makes no sense.

For example you come around the corner with a torch where several goblins are mining and two are on watch. Seeing the light shining from a nearby corridor the goblins; use their action to alert the other goblins who are working, prepare to use their action to shoot arrows once the PCs round the corner, or some other action. The PCs would have a chance to hear the nearby noise of clanging pickaxes.

Now some might add well you could always allow them to ready an action. But it would be nice for some clear cut rules. I apologize for the rant but it just upsets me that there isnt a clear cut way or an example in the playtest rules. If I have overlooked something please point me in the right direction.

Thanks I figured that was what it meant but needed some clarification.

Not trying to hijack this thread. But since we are on wands. The rules state "Any physical material components and cost were provided when the wand was crafted, but you must spend a Somatic Casting action in place of each Material Casting action required to cast the spell." So for a wand of magic missile you must use a somatic casting action in place of the material component which gives you one missile and counts as the casting action. Could a player then use another somatic casting action to give it two missiles and then the verbal casting action to give it the third missile as described in the magic missile spells entry? I guess the short question is can you use multiple casting actions of the same in this case the somatic casting action that takes place of the material casting action and then another somatic casting action for the somatic casting action? Just is a bit confusing to me.

Fumarole, what map maker are you using? I have been looking for something decent and these maps look amazing.

Ok so let me get this right. An alchemist can only make 2 bombs with advanced alchemy and one with quick alchemy. They could create 4 during downtime activity or 8 if they have the level 4 feat efficient alchemy but would have to roll the usual crafting roll to see if they suceed?

You either harm or heal not both. If you pick heal you are locked out of harm and visa versa. It is modeled off how good clearics used to destroy undead, while evil controlled and healed them.

It is also pretty cool how heal and harm are gated behind Cleric.

Thanks for the quick response. But are you talking about the harm and heal spells? I am actually referencing the positive energy portion of the spell that says you can use heal to heal the living or do damage to undead.

So with the heal spell it says that "you channel energy to heal the living or harm the undead". In this sentence it makes me believe that you can do one OR the other. Then if you look under the three action variant it says "This has the same effect as the two-action version, but it targets all living and undead creatures" in this sentence we see living AND undead. Does this mean that both situations happen? All players are healed and any undead within the burst area are harmed or does the cleric choose one or the other?

Also, is spontaneous casting not a thing anymore? So clerics cant swap out a spell for a healing spell or is there a feat?

Yes, I live in Southern VA so I am hoping that they come tomorrow as well.

It would be cool to have different tier towns offer different levels of training in ways that spell level effected what spells you could purchase at specific locations. Maybe certain feats are only offered by certain trainers or perhaps only certain guilds. Maybe the hermit in the swamp has access to alchemical feats but he is only willing to part with those after you fix the local troglydite problem ect. That's why I like making homebrew campaigns.

I really hope that they have numerous entries for some monsters. For instance Orc ecology: Orc Chieftains, war lords, warriors, worg riders, trackers, female and young entries. I know these are things we could create ourselves but I really think D&D 5e really hit on this with their monster manuals. I know that they said that they have monster stat blocks that are not as long so this should free up room to make variant types or flesh out monster ecology of humanoid types and other creatures that may have variant types.

I can honestly see where it looks complicated. Let's face it we all have those players that can barely figure out what to do with a standard and a move action. Now add three things? But like I mentioned before it opens up the ability for more complex yet faster combat encounters. As it stands our current session might go 4 hours with three of those being one or two combat encounters. I would like to be able to have more encounters or a balance of encounter and story depending on what my players want. I think this action economy will open those doors. You make a lot of great points Mathmuse.

I like the three action system honestly for a few reasons but I'm going to list one that makes me happy. I can now run out of cover shot my ranger weapon and take cover behind a nearby wall. Gone are the days of needing a feat. Tactics in the game has just improved.

I think the biggest problem is that many people are jumping to conclusions without having the rulebook in front of them. As Seisho mentioned above I don't think it is going to be as complicated. Don't forget CMB, CMD, and what conditions you and your opponent have when grappling. Did you make your check to maintain your grapple? Ok if you want to pin him you need to roll again.

I believe the system has been refined and improved.

With the new success system in place it could look like this. Ok so you want to grapple him? Roll! Ok critical success not only did you manage to grapple your opponent but you also pinned him. Or critical failure! You try to grapple him but he breaks free and begins to take off down a nearby ally way.

O and what combat maneuvers can we use as attack of opportunities again?

Got into Pathfinder halfway through it's run, was disappointed to hear my recently bought books were going to be obsolete, because they still feel new to me.

However, the skeleton for the new rules is built around the same bugs I created extensive houserules to solve. This means that we have similar goals in what a ruleset should be able to do.

Honestly I mostly like everything I've seen in blogs so far - especially the beginnings of codifying the exploration and downtime modes of play - to create baseline expectations similar to those that already exist for combat.

This is exactly the same thing I am feeling. I feel like even though the encounter creation rules give you the basis of making an encounter, My group seems to be able to overcome them pretty easily. When I tried 5e D&D the encounters were so close in some occasions that it literally could have came down to a botch dice roll which was better from a challenge stand point but not for a let the dice determine the players fate.

Not going to participate in the playtest - I'm sure you all will do a fine job - because I will finish running my games with my playgroups with the materials we have.

I am hoping that you do participate in the playtest. I understand your running a game I am as well but I think being part of the playtest is the only way that myself as well as you and others on here will be able to help the design team put together a game that WE as players and customers alike will be able to shape into something that will be truly amazing and I am grateful that Paizo is giving us the ability to do this.

Gotta ask this...

When we were hit with the news of the playtest, and second edition, am I the only one that decided, "I'm gonna start another first edition campaign."? Some people act like their entire gaming world ended due to a playtest. C'mon, your players never hit 20th level with this, you have no reason to put die and pencil down...

I actually started Wrath of the Righteous campaign a few months back so I'm not missing a beat on that campaign. I did do some modifications to it though. I made each player a weapon in which they have to find four pieces to unlock its special ability. Each part has a special ability tied to it. For instance the dagger our Rogue found is a dagger that he can use once per day to use vampiric touch and recover some hit points. He doesn't know that using it on certain creatures in the adventure path could have ramifications. I also scaled up a few creatures in further in so that giving these weapons wouldn't cause the adventure to be a walk in the park.

It gets me how some people in this forum are just pure ignorant towards the developers. I have been a Pathfinder GM since it came out and I have been a Paizo customer for sometime. So trust me when I say I can not wait to get my hands on the books that I purchased. A wait is a wait stop being impatient we are in the final stretch!

Enrik, this is exactly what I am confused on. So I understand players get 3 actions unless you have benefits of haste or slow then you would gain or lose additional actions. It would be easier for me to understand an operate activation and a cast activation (using RP) or some other representation of the action system. The way I understand it the [[A]] represents an action. But what is really messing with my head is operate activation, focus activation, ect. It would be easier for me to say ok I need to use an action to activate this ability or a RP point to activate the spell portion of the item.

I guess we dont really know the exact nature of the beast until we can actually look at the rulebook. Is there a blog that lists the different action types because I think that the blogs releases should be based on building up additional rules that are already presented. I believe this would make the picture easier to understand. Don't get me wrong I am loving the system I am just hoping my players will be able to catch onto the system with relative ease.

Couldn't you instead of using Focus Activation use Resonance Activation? With Resonance Activation the player knows that an RP needs to be used in order to use the magical abilities of the item. Where as the Operate Activation is simply the player using an action to "operate the hood" of the cloak of elvenkind.

So the stat block definitely looks improved and I am liking everything I have seen so far. Does the creature 3 entry on the Ogre take the place of monster CR's I am assuming and having said that there must be a new encounter building system I am guessing when it comes to the GM making encounters for the players. A last but important question is will there be additional monsters for the same creatures? For instance a goblin, goblin shaman, goblin warrior, goblin trapper ect. since the monsters stat blocks have decreased or will this be something that the GM will have to create? I would love to have additional monsters of the same type in case the players stumble upon the lair of said monsters.