Violet_Jade's page

On the Character Options page (https://paizo.com/pathfindersociety/characteroptions), under Lost Omens: Hellfire Crisis, it makes the following statements:

The Secondary Initiation boon in the boon store is intended to allow Pathfinder Society agents to qualify for feats or archetypes which, as a prerequisite or access condition, require membership in another organization (or similar conditions, such as invitations from another organization).

To be explicit: to take the Hellknight Dedication feat, your character must purchase the Secondary Initiation boon (to cover the Hellknight training) and be from Old Cheliax. This fulfills both the Prerequisites and Access for this feat. To take the Golden Legionnaire Dedication your character must be trained in heavy armor and purchase the Secondary Initiation boon, and so on.

Characters who previously took the Hellknight archetype may freely retrain into the new one in this book, provided the player owns a copy of this book as usual.

Based on this, you have a few options. Option 1 is to leave your character as they are, no problem, as it's not treated as "errata". Option two is to buy the book and update, which, since there's no date/time period attached to the statement about freely retraining, is something that you could choose to do at any time. (i.e. if you want to use the new version and don't own the book yet, you can keep using the old version, save up for the new book or ask for it as a gift at some point if you have any holidays/events in your life where gifts are exchanged, and then retrain to the newer version for free once you do have the book, be it tomorrow or six months from now)

Extremely pleasantly surprised to see the retroactive replayable tag for PFS2E. I was hoping to see at least a change to all-repeatable scenarios moving forward if Society was going to stick with the new two-level format for scenarios, so that I didn't feel like I wanted to pass on a scenario because the character I would want to play it as isn't at the right level for it yet. The retroactive part of it also means as someone who came into Society in the middle of Season 5 (or 4? I forget), when I GM, I don't have to worry as much about whether the table full of mostly-veteran players have already done a scenario; if I think it looks cool/fun, I can run it, and people get credit for it. There's a lot of the backlog from years past that I think looks really cool that I've never gone into before and I'm excited to run, in addition to the newer stuff!

Also, the Year of Clockwork Mystery...how exciting! I love the occasional sprinkling of strange, anachronistic stuff into Golarion's setting, like clockwork and broken-down timeworn Numerian tech, so an overarching plot about piece of ancient clockwork with an unknown function and purpose sounds super fun and interesting!

The Nidalese Horselord in Hellfire Dispatches has some of my new favorite feats:
One that lets you use a reaction to take extra damage from a fiend when it hits you, just to show them you absolutely do not care, and so deal spirit damage with the sanctified trait in return (no save), along with also rolling Intimidate to counteract its auras for a turn!
One that lets your horse walk upwards on nothing at a 45 degree angle if it's dark outside!

I love oddball, edge-case (but useful) effects like that!

S'pose that i have resistance to fire 5 and I take a strike that does 2 fire and 2 silver-fire damage. do i resist all of that or just 2?

If I'm understanding the clarification correctly, you would resist all of it, because all of it is fire coming from a single combined effect.

If you instead had "Resistance: fire 5 (except silver)", then you'd only resist 2, because the other 2 is both fire and silver. (I'm pretty sure this one isn't something that's achievable, but it's just a thought experiment.)

If you had "Weakness: silver 5" and "Resistance: fire 5", it becomes a little unclear. When you add damage due to your weakness, the damage is the type of that weakness.
Logically, I would expect that means that the damage's type is only the weakness's type and not any other type, meaning that you would take 5 additional silver damage that is not fire, and you would take up to 5 less fire damage, which would be 5 total damage, all of which is just silver.
I could potentially see someone trying to say that the weakness damage is both silver and fire because the damage that triggered the weakness was silver and fire, therefore setting the total incoming damage at 4, but I think with the way this clarification specifies that you apply both damage type and special material weaknesses separately, each amount of damage taken due to a particular weakness is intended to be only of the weakness's type.
(This one's niche, but still technically possible, if you're a werewolf wearing a Charm of Fire Resistance and somebody shoots you in the face with a Moonlit Spellgun.)

Those throwing shields also tend to not technically work with a Returning rune at all, without some houserule.

You're right, I'd been operating under the mistaken assumption that the Shield Throw trait explicitly allowed for the etching of weapon runes, but there's nothing that says anything about it affecting runes that can be etched at all.

I can't say I know at this point whether it would be better to reword the recent clarification and add clarifications for affected feats and for how throwing shields are intended to work, or if it would be better to remove the clarification and leave it to GM interpretation. I don't know other people's tables well enough to know if there's a lot of contention about shield action economy; all I can say is I've never once questioned the idea that a shield is equipped as part of an action that draws it (probably by slipping an arm into an already properly-adjusted strap).

With regards to the clarification on equipping and unequipping shields, where does that leave options that explicitly manipulate the action economy of shields, like Lightning Swap or the Viking Dedication's Second Shield feat?

As written, the clarification forbids you from putting away an equipped Shield with Lightning Swap, and also doesn't allow you to equip the shield when you "draw a weapon and a shield" as specified in the feat. It also forbids you from removing/dropping/putting away a broken but not destroyed shield while using Second Shield and prevents you from using Raise a Shield afterward without spending additional actions because the feat doesn't equip the shield. (I assume that you don't need to unequip a destroyed shield, because I assume a destroyed item ceases to exist as far as determining whether it's worn or equipped is concerned.)

It also makes shields built for throwing, such as the Razor Disc, Meteor Shield, and shields with the Shield Throw trait largely pointless. Even if those shields have a Returning rune etched to them, they won't be equipped when they return to your hand, so you would have to use four actions each turn to make use of them as both a weapon and a shield. (Unequip shield, throw shield, equip shield, raise shield) You also wouldn't be able to unequip the shield to throw it if something was in your other hand, and you wouldn't be able to equip it when it returns to you in that instance, either.

That is, of course, only true if I interpret those abilities exactly as they're written, word-for-word. Perhaps the intent is that options like the Second Shield and Lightning Swap feats are intended to include equipping/unequipping shields properly as part of their action(s), and that shields built for throwing are intended to be re-equipped for free on return. Either way, I would appreciate if we could receieve additional clarification on the shield errata with respect to abilities like this, or for the errata to be altered in some fashion to better reflect the intent.

The two things I'm happiest to see between the two classes are:

Combination weapon support from Slayer. It feels like we have so little that plays with combination weapons, and I'd love more for them. There's a single Gunslinger way that cares about them, and it's Gunslinger, so there's a heavy focus on the ranged aspect when I'd like more that focuses on the melee aspect or on switching modes quickly, efficiently, or with flair.

Dynamic environmental combat from Daredevil. More specifically, I like Breakaway Attack and its follow-up feats a lot. The effect is comparable to good weapon choices, benefits from fundamental runes so that it can stay relevant, and the later feats add options for more varied and interesting uses, like hitting multiple targets at the same MAP and bleed damage. I have always looked longingly at Weapon Improviser as a dedication and always shied away from it because there's so much GM adjucation involved in what damage, traits, etc an improvised weapon has, and I don't want to bog down GMs or get different answers depending on who I'm talking to when I'm planning out my turn before it happens. (I'm known at one table for "creative solutions" but I don't want to let that get so out of hand that it causes anybody else to stop having fun.) Specific, set damage dice, type, and traits might not be flavor-perfect, but I think it's a good compromise to streamline play without stifling creativity. I do think that the feat should explicitly note the weapon proficiency used for the Strike, though. For the playtest, it's likely fine, because Daredevil doesn't inherently have different proficiencies for unarmed/simple/martial and isn't proficient in advanced natutally, so the assumption could be that it doesn't matter. The problem will come on release, when Daredevil is archetyped onto classes like Fighter, Gunslinger, Monk, or other classes with proficiency progressions that don't match Daredevil's. It would be nice if they had the Strike count as using an improvised weapon for the purposes of any feats, items, abilities, or effects that specifically call out improvised weapons, but that's not something that's needed to make the rules work so much as something that would create synergy with Weapon Improviser or other options.

Say, if I filled a backpack with crowbars, how many actions do y'all think it would take to upturn it and spill those suckers all over my square for use with Breakaway Attack?

@Violet-Jade,

I was really excited when first looking at the Faith Tattoo, but then realized it wouldn’t help. Since I am already sanctified that part of it doesn’t help. It does not make the Strikes Holy by itself.

The first time I read the tattoo, I thought it allowed casting any 1st rank divine spell. Then I realized no, it was the 1st rank spell given by the deity.

Trick Magic Item isn’t a good solution because you would need to have the scroll in hand, spend an action to Trick Magic Item and then use the scroll. Minimum of two actions in the same round, likely three actions if you include getting out the scroll. I realized that I would seldom do this.

If there were an item that allowed me to activate it to Infuse Vitality that would work for me.

Still would prefer a boon or item that just allows Holy characters to apply that trait to their Strikes.

The only feat/class selection options I can think of for becoming holy and not having access to cast Infuse Vitality (formerly Disrupting Weapons) or innate ability to add the trait (e.g. Champion class/archetype, or Sanctified Soul from Exemplar when your weapon deals spirit damage from its Immanence ability) are Cultivator and the Vindicator Ranger archetype.

Cultivator's a weird one because you don't worship a deity/philosophy/covenant as a Cultivator, so it's hard to get around.

Vindicator technically has a 12th-level feat that allows adding the trait to your Strikes, but that's not particularly handy for Society play. The Zeal domain (if it's in your deity's domains) could allow it for a single focus point, though that's also not great.

A couple things I absolutely forgot about, though, are the 5th level uncommon but boon-accessible Alicorn Lance from Treasure Vault (it inherently has the Holy trait), the 9th level common specific magic weapon from GM Core: Chaplain's Cudgel (a fun option, because it has a shifting rune that allows it to turn into your deity's favored weapon, even if that weapon is a ranged weapon).

The only thing I can figure is that the design intent of class features that let you add your sanctification to Strikes must be that they're considered powerful enough that Paizo doesn't believe lower levels to be an appropriate time to be able to easily replicate them without taking a specific feat, set of feats, or spell(s).

(Sorry I couldn't be more helpful; I was hoping to help you find an option that worked for now.)

I would like a boon that would allow someone who is Holy to make their strikes carry that trait.

Champions that are sanctified have this. None of the other sanctified options provide it.

War Priests and anyone taking the Mortal Herald archetype could be Holy, depending on deity of course.

While this isn't an actual solution, until such a boon exists, there is one roundabout way to make this happen.

A character who worships a deity who allows holy sanctification but is not otherwise sanctified can become sanctified through the purchase of a Faith Tattoo (level 4 common magical tattoo, Treasure Vault pg 120), which binds them to the same edicts & anathema that a cleric, champion, or other worshiper who gains class abilities or spells from that deity would have.

Such a character (or any holy character who doesn't innately add their sanctification to their Strikes) could then cast Infuse Vitality (rank 1 divine spell, Player Core pg 338) either as a divine spell (if they can cast divine spells) or from a scroll or wand with the Trick Magic Item feat (DC 15 Religion; Assurance would allow a trained character to automatically succeed from level 3 onward or an expert from level 2 onward), applying their holy trait to the Strikes of the affected characters (as the spell is worded such that the holy trait applies regardless of whether or not the added vitality damage would have any effect on Strike targets).

I suppose technically an Exemplar or someone with the Exemplar archetype could take the Sanctified Soul feat if they have a weapon ikon to add a Holy effect on their Strikes, as well. That one seems less ideal because it requires picking a specific class or single-use archetype, which it sounds like would defeat the purpose of what you're requesting.

It isn't ideal, I know, and I hope there are more options added at some point, but if you're looking to try to make this happen now, it's at least somewhat possible. If a little...convoluted.

There are a few uncommon weapons in Treasure Vault that are not currently on the list of those allowable with the Avid Collector boon that would be lovely if they could be added.

Specifically, I'm interested in those listed under Combination Weapons. I really like combination weapons, but of the 18 so far in the game, 12 of them are firearms in their ranged form. Accessing combination firearms has become much easier in Society recently, and I enjoy having some of my characters use firearms, but not all of them.

The Bow Staff is of particular interest to me, although it may be that the intent is not to allow access to Monk or Ancestry weapons with the boon. I also know that there's at least one archetype as of Battlecry with a feat that gives access to the Crescent Cross, but that still leaves the Lancer without any means of access at all, so far as I can tell.

Also of interest to me as potential additions to the list are the uncommon Spark Guns (as I don't believe there is any way to access them, unless the statement that they're "common in the Arcane Empires and Deadshot Lands regions" of Arcadia, but usually an access entry will explicitly use the word "access" and that paragraph does not).

Will the applicable spells for each curriculum expansion boon (or their criteria, if it is based on spell traits and not a specific list of spells) be listed in the FAQ? Or, are they already listed somewhere and I've missed them? I'm very curious about those boons.

To echo Johann, there are a ton of interesting options out there.

Vitality healers can use Spirit Link/Share Life to transform damage that your void healer would take into damage that they can heal off themselves far easier.

Soothe is always great, as long as you're talking about a PC or non-mindless companion.

Cheap, reusable temp HP effects like the Faith's Flamekeeper witch's familiar ability and Rousing Splash can help, too.

Check summon lists, too, if you're worried or starved for options: as an example, if you're in the 3-4 range, Augurs can be summoned with rank 2 Summon Lesser Servitor, and they come with 3 castings of rank 1 Harm (which I consider a real bargain at that level - spend one rank 2 slot for 3 rank 1 2-action "healing" spells? Sign me up!)

Yeah. It is what it is; it just would've been nice to have the parry on the melee half, which is the half I would prefer to use while in melee. Having it on the ranged half is a little awkward for a Way that wants you to invest heavily in Strength.

Thanks for the answers, all!

I see. Thank you.

I thought I'd finally found a use for the Gun Sword, dang. Oh, well. Maybe it'd be better to just go with a Dawnsilver Tree with Weapon Improviser Dedication, or something.

I'm building a Vanguard with the intent to use a Gun Sword as the character's weapon and take Defensive Armaments to give them the ability to defend themselves in melee, where they'll likely be spending most of their time.

How is Defensive Armaments intended to interact with combination weapons like the Gun Sword? Is the intent that only the ranged half gains the Parry trait? Or does the weapon itself gain the parry trait because it is a single object with two modes?

I'll have to just deal with whatever the answer is, but it would significantly affect how the character would act and whether it would be worth it to take the Mauler Dedication.

I have a clarification question about the Yaoguai's Morphic Strikes feat for the Born of Elements Yaoguai heritage from the Tian Xia Character Guide.

The feat states that the unarmed strike gains the "same elemental traits" as the cantrip chosen for that heritage. However, while Ignition, Needle Darts, Timber, Scatter Scree, Slashing Gust, and Spout all have traits corresponding to an element, Electric Arc and Frostbite do not.

Do the unarmed strikes gain no traits if the player selects Electric Arc or Frostbite? Are those two supposed to be associated with elements despite not having any elemental traits? Or, are the energy traits for those two spells meant to be gained by the unarmed strike when Morphic Strikes is selected?

I have been looking through feats, spells, and items from Lost Omens: Knights of Lastwall for a character theme. There are a number of feat options which require a deity alignment (and in other cases, a player alignment).

Divine Emissary states the following:
"Prerequisites a familiar, you follow a good-aligned deity or patron"

How is this to be handled in the remaster? It's a Sorcerer/Witch feat, so I cannot imagine that the PC must be sanctified to select the feat, because Sorcerer and Witch don't have sanctification options. Is it based upon deity sanctification?

For options which required PC alignments, are those now based upon whether or not a player is sanctified? Or is there some other determining factor, or are these options simply no longer available?

It would be nice if there were a "Friends From" boon for Rage of Elements, like the ones for Book of the Dead, Age of Ashes, and Howl of the Wild. I'd love to be able to take an elemental as an animal companion on a Ranger without needing to take the Druid archetype purely for access.

I would like to rebuild my Champion for Society play to utilize some of the new options. Since I'd like to keep the Redeemer cause, I believe I'll have to pick a new deity, as Pharasma doesn't allow holy sanctification, so she's no longer a valid option for a remastered Redeemer. (I am making this assumption specifically because I am considering rebuilding, rather than continuing to use the old CRB chassis for Champion utilizing remaster errata.)

However, the vast majority of deities not in the Core 20, along with the one who will be joining the Core 20 later this year, have only errata'd versions of their allowable sanctifications. If I select a deity who has not yet received official sanctification information other than through that errata, and that deity is later printed without holy sanctification even though the errata allows for that sanctification now, would I be required to then purchase a rebuild boon to select another deity?

So, does this rules change mean that Tiny Sprites with Evanescent Wings must spend two actions to Interact with any item not on their person?

Very interesting! How does this change affect characters who worshiped and received power from a pantheon that explicitly included Gorum or another deity that will bite it? Are affected pantheons going to be explicitly removed, changed in Divine Mysteries, or kept the same but without the deities that have perished?

(The specific pantheon in question for a player of mine is the Gravelady's Guard, a pantheon that...very explicitly is three deities, one of whom will die and two of whom will not.)

Alas Violet Jade,

I cannot find the full text of these boons anywhere either. I believe that Alex is off at a convention this weekend, but he might be willing to reply to an email written to organizedplay@paizo.com. I'd write to him and ask if he can provide the full text of these boons.

Happy Gaming,
Hmm

Thank you for your answer! I started looking into it early enough that it's gonna be a bit before we have a Chronicle for people to think about, so I've got time to wait until he's back to hear from him via that email.

I've been scouring the web to find the full text of the chronicle boons available to players and GMs who've gone through the Kingmaker AP and Companion Guide. But I can't find anywhere what character options actually become available when those chronicle boons are purchased. The chronicle sheets themselves just say that you get the boon, and don't list any access options related to the boon. The FAQ similarly doesn't list the full text of boons from most Adventure Paths.

Is there a place where the full boon text from Adventure Path Chronicles can be found? I would like to be sure that I and my players are aware of the types of options that will become available before everyone decides what character(s) to apply credit to. If the text contains spoilers then I'll definitely just want to give a summary of the option types to them instead of the full text. If there's some source that just shows all sanctioned Adventure Path boon text for second edition, that'd probably be even better for myself and other GMs.

Apologies if this is listed in some obvious place, but when I couldn't find the info in the chronicles, on the FAQ, or on the forums, I figured it would be best to ask in case I'm missing something!

Hello all! I am trying to build a Courtly Hunter for Society play. Since the Courtly Hunter's companion has an Intelligence score progression just like a familiar, I believe that it gains the following benefits:
1 language known (from gaining intelligence of 3+)
Ability to learn additional languages (by putting skill ranks into Linguistics)

I could be wrong on that, it may be that it can only gain languages by putting ranks into Linguistics, or maybe it knows a number of languages that the Hunter speaks? But, regardless, if it has a familiar's int, I believe it should be able to learn languages.

Obviously, with a few exceptions that someone could probably argue based on real life (which I don't think is really a kind of argument I want to bring to a table), an animal companion still can't actually speak. For an example of what I mean, the rules say raven familiars speak supernaturally, so I'm not going to try to argue about something like a Giant Raven or other creature that's capable of mimicking voices in real life. I want to do fun stuff, but I don't want to grind the table to a screeching halt for stuff that probably only I would enjoy.

However, I wanted to ask about a couple of alternative communication methods I'd thought of. Is Sign Language for one or more specific dialects a legal choice for Linguistics? If so, I could potentially take a bethumbed companion such as a chimpanzee or ape and communicate with it that way. The other question was, would the Prehensile Tail feat for a betailed creature allow the creature to write? I don't want to get my hopes up about that one.

I know that if an animal companion knows a language, that they can understand anyone speaking it, but I was really hoping there could be a way for the companion to communicate back, especially when it gets more intelligent over time and has the potential to use things like Knowledge skills or have other reasons to impart information to its adventuring party.

Sorry if this is a weird question!

If anyone is still interested, please join the following game:

http://www.ongoingworlds.com/games/1208

Irnk: Yes, Paizo player companion content will also be allowed, as long as you are using content such as traits, feats, etc. and not pregenerated characters from outside We Be Goblins!

All dice rolling will be done using InvisibleCastle. (http://invisiblecastle.com/) For the purposes of this campaign we will call it "Goblin Frenzy". Otherwise posts on Ongoing Worlds are done using the character as the poster, so keeping track of turns in combat should be straightforward.

You can either use the pregenerated characters in the We Be Goblins! Adventure Path, or generate a first level Goblin character using average gold for the class in question. The stat system used for custom characters will be 15 point-buy. All official Paizo content will be allowed.

You are allowed one character trait from any official Paizo content that applies, including those that the pregenerated characters in We Be Goblins! have.

Let me know if there are parts of your questions you think I haven't answered well enough or if you have more!

Hello! I am preparing to host the two We Be Goblins! modules and I am looking for newer players. I have one already, and can take up to three more. The game will be hosted on Ongoing Worlds. Is anyone interested?