WatersLethe's page

SuperBidi wrote:

eoptap wrote:

Racial Weapon feats should be automatic for the race for free.

They are one of the few impactful Ancestry feats. If you remove them, you're very close to remove Ancestry feats entirely.

All my characters who can speak with animals, have a familiar, are great at sneaking, gain a multiclass dedication, turn into bottles and roll around combat etc etc etc disagree with you.

There are a LOT of ancestry feats that fall into at least one of useful, character defining flavour, build defining.

There are also, admittedly, lots that fall into the category of "kinda cool flavour, very rarely of any actual use"

Yeah, there are a ton of really cool, flavorful, and effective ancestry feats. I've actually never taken a racial weapon feat because the competition is so tough.

I would open my arms wide for a BUNCH more ancestry feat options for every ancestry though.

Just some questions that we might want to think about:

1. Do lasers work under water? They deal fire damage, does that stop them from being fired under water?

2. Should there be an Underwater upgrade, similar to the Underwater rune?

3. How is the range and area of Area weapons affected? (Does the unexploded Stellar Cannon projectile count as a piercing weapon)

4. Should there be a "Traveler's Chair" to grant a swim speed? (Effectively a waterjet pack, or other propulsion pack)

5. An automatic machine gun's auto fire would have a pathetic 10ft cone RAW. Is that too punishing?

There are so many important abilities that are gated behind two actions, and you tend to get more of them the higher level you are, which makes Ready grow less and less compelling as you level up. You also get more reactions too, which is another opportunity cost. I am therefore interested in this line of thought.

The biggest issue I can see is opening up the majority of spells, and allowing them to occur in the middle of an enemy's turn. Like, some kind of wall spell *after* they've already moved, boxing them in somewhere without actions to get out, wasting their whole turn instead of 1 or 2 actions. Or perhaps seeing that a flying target has used two non-fly actions, then you cast something to rob them of their last action so they fall.

However, I struggle to come up with scenarios that are truly broken. Especially if you used 3 Actions to ready a 2 action activity, to pay off the action economy tax man.

I think we all know that the point of PFS is to act as a scapegoat for why someone's pet rule issue needs to be written in airtight legalese, since obviously PFS GMs operate like punchcard computers.

I'm really hoping for Technomancer to be a standard bearer for virtual reality, augmented reality, and software. I think manipulating hardware is easily handled by other classes, so junkbots and tech-flavored-fireballs shouldn't be the focus.

I want Radagast, but stepping out of the Matrix, wearing a blue screen of death as a cloak, carrying a staff from a video game boss, with a wild look in his eye.

Getting the most out of forceful means getting as many attacks in a round as possible, and hitting with those attacks. You also need to stay toe-to-toe a lot, so HP matters quite a bit. I think Flurry Ranger is the best mix for this, with a dash of rogue to get sneak attacker (to make up for the smaller damage die than other 2handers) and mobility to get into position to maximize off-guard up-time.

* Ancient Elf for movement speed and rogue dedication
* Ranger for flurry, better HP than rogue
* Go for action and movement efficiency abilities to let you spend as few actions on movement and setup as possible. (Nimble Elf, Elf Step, Quick Draw, Mobility, Reactive Pursuit)
* Focus on getting survival and stealth up so you can Hunt Prey outside of combat, and get closer before combat. (Terrain Stalker, Quiet Allies, Warden's Step)
* Find a way to get quickened reliably

Although it's a bit of a shame to have high strength as well, the only way out of that is really to go Thief rogue and you end up needing to move around too much and being to squishy to spend all your actions on more attacks.

As a GM, in my experience, there has never been an instance of a low skill, low power PC and a high skill, high power PC playing in the same group where one didn't meaningfully contribute. Certainly there hasn't been a case where a player felt they were overshadowed enough for them to stop having fun.

It has been my experience that you can bash a character together, keep in mind attack stat and AC, and have a great time.

Have seen next to no "Damage isn't important" discourse. Have seen loads of "DPR is incredibly misleading and not very useful".

This thread makes me think the OP conflates DPR and damage.

I like Automatic Rune Progression more than ABP. Magic and tech items that give bonuses to specific skills have never been a problem, and I like that you can switch them out easily if you need to.

I'd love a version of Automatic Rune Progression (Weapon and Armor baseline math advancement only) to get published.

Agreed that it makes a lot of sense for a Sci-fi adjacent game, and it's solves the "everyone is expected to have a gun (or a variety of guns), but good luck affording to keep up with the costs"

I mostly miss the multiple-pass playtesting from the PF2 Playtest. I understand it's not really worth it outside of a new edition playtest, but it was so cool to see "live" updates and changes.

Happened to be making an Investigator for an upcoming oneshot, and noticed that Automatic weapons are pretty great for Devise a Stratagem. Think you'll miss? Spray and pray instead and make THEM roll.

I would allow option A. I think being permissive about retraining is helpful for my planning as a GM as well as for the player.

Big fan of the four traditions as I am, I am also firmly against pick-a-tradition classes without *deep* reasons for it. I can see Occult fitting the Necromancer decently well, but would sooner drop slotted casting as a whole than try to fit primal or divine casting onto the chassis.

Primal would 100% be the wrong choice, and divine has way too many options that warp the flavor of the class.

Sentimental value and/or collector's value.

I prefer Skeleton archers because they're super iconic. Just sayin' skeletons throwin' skulls in PF2 is already here to stay.

Skeletons you fight as enemies are already throwing their skulls. Not sure why players shouldn't be able to work with that as well.

Can't do much about what was already written, but I think it's a good idea to spare a thought for it while we're making new stuff!

My hot take is that it's a good idea to try to make PF2 classes fit in well with SF2 if you don't have to go far out of your way for it. Partly because there are so, so many Science Fantasy stories I want to tell with PF2 style characters, and partly because it's good value for money and a huge benefit for cross compatibility.

A Necromancer in Space is such a juicy concept (and Eox proves that) and I just want to point out that thralls look *rough* in Starfinder. Low range for summoning, no mobility, no ranged attacks, and susceptibility to the more common AoE damage all add up to a bad time.

Wondering how much of that is overly punishing even in PF2's more "melee meta" against certain types of encounters.

I'd love to see options for "archer" thralls with ranged attacks, and thralls that stick-to/chase a target to get some more flexible and dynamic play.

Archer skeleton thralls scratches a certain itch for me, that's for sure.

WatersLethe wrote:

Sounds pretty reasonable.

I'm wondering how that's better for the war lance over the regular lance though, am I missing something?

The war lance gives up extra reach for the parry and shove traits; if I apply lunge to all jousting weapons (which is just the lance and war lance), the war lance gets the same charging reach as the regular lance. Granted, that's already the case now (at least on a large-or-bigger-sized mount), so I suppose you'd be correct in pointing out that it doesn't really change anything for the war lance vs the regular lance. On an unrelated note, I should add on a caveat that you don't get the added reach if you're already getting the regular lance's extended reach. (I don't want to incentivize people getting on smaller mounts just to get extra reach.)

Quote:

The weapon is suited for mounted combat with a harness or similar means. When mounted, if you moved at least 10 feet on the action before your attack, add a circumstance bonus to damage for that attack equal to the number of damage dice for the weapon. Also, if your reach is not already increased, increase your reach by five feet for that attack as well.

(edited for clarity)

I see! Makes sense now.

But yeah, I like your solution quite a bit

Wouldn't mind seeing:

-Riot Shield/Ballastic Shield
-Silencers
-darkvision/thermal goggles (not implants)
-self-injecting armor upgrade (inject potion or serium as swift action, but takes a standard action to change the cartridge)
-mines/demolition explosives
-pizza flinger...I need it >.> for a game. It has a purpose. Honestly.

I'm in awe of this post from 2017

I would very much like there to be an ability to get old thralls to contribute more, so enemies don't get comfy with the idea that they're just dummies.

One thing I don't like is that, since demoralize makes them immune for 10 minutes, you might demoralize two targets, focus one down, and then the other's frightened conditions wears off before you can fully capitalize.

I agree that there is some flavor missing. No-cost, impermanent thralls are decidedly unsatisfying if what you're after is someone who has the ability to desecrate corpses into tools for their own bidding. The fact that they can't move, don't use materials, and don't leave anything behind when defeated makes them feel hollow.

The mechanical expression in combat seems like a pretty great idea, though.

I have a feeling that these things can be fixed.

* When I say "no-cost" the cost I'm talking about is the narrative expense of being a body-botherer collecting cadavers by the sweat of your brow, and causing all sorts of problems in-world for doing so.

* "Impermanent" is a problem because it feels like a summoner, a magical effect, not an undead creation. The stories we tell about Necromancers requires a certain level of permanence and therefore consequence to their craft. No one cares if Jim is summoning and dismissing magical nothings in his house if no one is getting hurt. They care if bodies are going missing, or if someone sees a dissected corpse through the window.

* "Immobility" is a problem because Necromancers create animated corpses. If they're not moving, they're not really animated, they're decoration.

For the first two, I think it would be interesting if Necromancers stored their low-power creations (their thralls) inside their shadows (a common anime trope). They could start play a certain number stored, and have a reasonably high cap that grows with level. Then they could track them like ammo, and fill their pool with the corpses of their enemies as well as their fallen thralls. If you use up all your thralls, then flee, leaving them behind, you would have to restock and suddenly you have RP opportunities galore.

This would make them permanent, and somewhat of a cost because you have to spend time recollecting your materials after a fight, or stocking up later. You could also do things like track the level of creature you stocked up from and add minor bonuses to your thralls, or even add some kind of equipment or modifications to specific cadavers in your collection.

The book-keeping would be worth it for the flavor I think. It'd be really cool to have a list of the creatures in your arsenal.

As for immobility, I wonder if they could be attached to targets instead of spaces. "Appear, attack target, and if the target moves, follow them" isn't really that complicated and not that powerful for how weak they are. Maybe there's room to play around there.

WatersLethe wrote:

Is there a trait or spell description saying you can't create thralls in mid-air?

As long as it's unoccupied, any space in range is viable. Of course, it would immediately fall so having them more than 5' off the ground means they die after you cast.

Okay, time to break out the 60 foot diameter hemispherical jungle gyms. We could also do it in a trampoline park! Or heck in a factory with a conveyor belt.

Sounds pretty reasonable.

I'm wondering how that's better for the war lance over the regular lance though, am I missing something?

Is there a trait or spell description saying you can't create thralls in mid-air?

Technically, gaining reach from your mount's space on a large mount is very strong, since it allows you to threaten a massive area, dramatically increasing the number of reactive strikes or other reactions you can make and how much of the battlefield you "control". This gets worse the larger your mount gets.

Your proposal probably isn't going to make a dramatic difference in people's enjoyment and the overall game balance, however. It just makes mounted combat stronger.

Unfortunately, it hasn't come up in my game, but my intention has been to rule it as each round at the start of your turn selecting a square of your mounts space and calculating reach from there as normal for the rest of the round.

Looks like they are already handing out the playtest document at PAX and we got some first information.

Both classes are Int-based.

The necro is a 2 slot caster. Creating a thralls within 30 ft takes one action. Thralls have only 1 HP and are automatically hit by anything thrown their way. Thqy can provide flanking. The Necro has a large number of focus spells available (most of them as feats I'd guess).

Haven't looked at the runesmith information close enough to cover it.

Thanks for the info!

First thought:

Auto-hit makes 3rd action attacks more useful for foes who might otherwise just flail and miss, but now get to use it to turn off a thrall.

Also interesting to see how hiring a squad of level 1 NPCs to counter the necromancer's thralls would play out.

I once ran a spooky scary skeleton oneshot where one of the skeleton PCs could command a troop of skeletons. It was actually pretty easy to handle, all things considered.

Sacrifice a lot of those int boosts and pick up Additional Lore feats for the things you're supposed to be knowledgeable about, and don't be shy about retraining if necessary. The specific lore DC reduction and auto scaling proficiency will massively outweigh int bonus.

Put those points into dex, because without heavy armor and bulwark, not only is your AC garbo, your reflex saves are in the s&!#ter as well.

You absolutely are under no obligation to make your Gunslinger a mama bear Dwarf from Alkenstar

I wouldn't say *no* obligation. You *do* have an obligation if you want to call yourself a decent person. /s

I think if they go the route of burning spell slots to generate thralls or otherwise power their abilities, Occult makes a lot of sense. You're leaning into the Mind and Spirit essences to enforce your mental control over spiritual objects including ghosts, but also the parts of souls bound to bodies to animate them. Life would be more pure vital and void energy that can be used to affect the living or dead, but that's kind of a secondary concern. The Occult spell list itself isn't super helpful for a Necromancer, but that only matters if they don't shake up how you spend slots.

I could certainly see it going Divine, but if you're mostly using your slots to pop out new sacrificial undead, being able to use Harm on them isn't part of your strategy.

If they want the Necromancer to cast Necromancy spells as normal, with some secondary class features that work on their own, then yeah I'd think there's going to be a lot of narrative dead weight on the class in the Occult list.

even outside the premise of rarity not being a proxy for power- it's two systems with different balance assumptions. "Investigator multiclass on Operative in a bug-hunt oneshot" is probably the sort of thing I wouldn't be allowing cross-pollination for.

Not disagreeing or anything, just want to point out that if we take a look at all classes in PF2 currently, Investigator is probably the one most likely to be brought over for its narrative function. Investigations in SF2 are even more common than in PF2, and we should probably get prepared for this exact discussion.

So, how would I actually handle this based on the premise? I would give free-action study against any target the Operative has already aimed at that turn. That way, there's always some action being spent on setup (but generally not two), and switching off the studied target comes at the cost of not getting the Aim benefits.

This is an *excellent* suggestion.

Your issue is likely just in the queue. They've got a pretty small team, and this time of year, with holidays, they're gonna be backed up no doubt.

WatersLethe wrote:

I like Infusion, but it's probably too strong. It's got so much versatility it dumpsters Lay on Hands.

I would always choose Lay on Hands over 1 action Infusion

Lay on Hands: The target regains 6 Hit Points. If the target is someone other than yourself, it also gains a +2 status bonus to AC for 1 round.

1 action Infusion: A willing creature, you restore 1d6 Hit Points. The
target is then temporarily immune for 10 minutes.

Out of combat, Lay on Hands is better than using a 3-action infusion. If you have time, just Lay on Hands until the whole party is healed without rolling any dice.

Also compared to the PF2e heal spell Infusion uses d6 instead of d8 The advantage the 3 action Infusion has over the heal spell is it won't heal enimines too.

If you had both, sure. If I had to choose between having access to Infusion or Lay on Hands, I would take Infusion 100% of the time for the improved healing at range, the option to do 1 action heal at touch for emergencies, and the AOE heal option.

I like Infusion, but it's probably too strong. It's got so much versatility it dumpsters Lay on Hands.

Thanks for the input!

I think I will go with Animal Barbarian and just reflavor the bear attacks. It ends up being pretty dang close to what I want in the end.

I'm making a character for a Starfinder game that's essentially a Shirren that was modified by the swarm to have a Hydralisk type battle form, but outside of that they're a kind of naive, inquisitive fellow.

I think I'm leaning toward trying to build this idea as a Summoner who takes on their Eidolon form with "Meld Into Eidolon".

Meld Into Eidolon appears to mostly just make me a bad martial. Is there a way to optimize it to get the most out of it? Has anyone played a summoner where you don't use the Eidolon separately at all? Any advice?

The most important errata?

The Redcap had it's scythe replaced by a halberd in the Monster Core, but it's reaction still uses a scythe attack. Since it's been acknowledged that the Monster Core art was accidentally based on DnD redcaps (who have halberds) instead of Pathfinder redcaps, it might be good to change back to a scythe, or at least update the ability to reference the halberd.

Gamebreaking, heartbreaking, Paizo this needs immediate fixing.

Let's go on a hunger strike.

Let's say a player multiclasses into Investigator for Devise a Stratagem.

Let's say they're in a Deep Rock Galactic style one-shot, facing off against a bunch of bugs, with no great mysteries.

Devise a Stratagem is a free action if you're aware that creature could help answer the question at the heart of one of your active investigations.

Q1: Would you allow this player to get free action Devise a Stratagems because each bug is helping to answer the investigative question "How many bugs am I going to kill today?" or some other sham investigation?

Q2: If a sniper operative *can* get reliable free-action Devise a Stratagems, how busted is that?

Q3: If Devise a Stratagem was always going to be 1 action in such a game, how would you optimize around it?

Basically since this is going to be a fun birthday oneshot I made a Devise a Stratagem Sniper for a player to use, and I really like how much better a sniper feels with that ability. If you're making one shot a round, dumping bad rolls and switching targets is so juicy. It makes me wonder if we're going to see a lot of investigator multiclass snipers.

I want to be my class's Maledictorian

Clerics were already VERY strong, and Benediction/Malediction are another powerful tool in their toolkit. Not overwhelming or anything, but a welcome addition to a buffer/debuffer style character.

I suspect that it would lead to a power differential in the party, though, since we got all kinds of players represented, from the OCD number cruncher to the guy who just wants to play with his friends and doesn't care much about numbers.

One of my players forgot they had a Free Archetype for several levels. Another tried to get the most juice out of it possible. No one noticed more of a difference in effectiveness than usual, because the "non-optimizer" was effective at the things their character cared about and the optimizer was already known for finding ways to solve problems, and having more flexibility than usual wasn't overly noticeable.

It's really not that big of a deal, one way or the other.

I would say if you are having plenty of fun without it, and no one is feeling constrained, don't bother picking up FA.

FA is great for people like me who feel that character customization is overly bottlenecked by class feat slots.

Whether or not Free Archetype gives power or not (it does) is academic. It's whether it's enough to make the GM have to account for it by balancing things differently (they don't).

The juice (extra player options and customization) is often very much worth the squeeze (chargen complexity).

WatersLethe wrote:

they just weren't that interested in most invested items.

Well, there you go. I've looked at my 10th lvl PFS char: 4 skill items (with other great bonuses of course), 1 focus item, armor (with 5th skill rune), cantrip ring, resistance ring, wayfinder - that's 9. And I'd fill on resistance rings up to 3-4 I think :D And I think I had several future plans on the remaining slot.

WatersLethe wrote:

Staff

Staves don't take investment as most of held items though.

Dang I could have sworn staves were invested. Shows what blind spots GMing gives you!

WatersLethe wrote:

My players got to level 15 in strength of thousands and never once came even close to the investment cap.

Were you very stingy with magic items or did they not care about them? Because getting to 10 is trivial at about level 10 (and you have to start choosing at this point). Armor, skill items, defensive things, it builds up fast.

I was ultra generous with wealth, but they just weren't that interested in most invested items.

I went back and reviewed and one character actually did hit 10! I never noticed. The others were sitting at around six: Staff, armor, ring of resist, movement item, skill item 1, skill item 2

They had other items they sold, and consumables that they never touched.

My players got to level 15 in strength of thousands and never once came even close to the investment cap.

I also have reservations about making body modification (which can feel like body horror to some and character defining to others) a baseline assumption. At minimum, I would allow a sort of "wearable tech" option that makes augmentations effectively worn gear from an in-world standpoint but functions normally mechanically. It would be better if none of them felt hugely powerful (dermal plating) and slotted into existing systems (grafts) rather then being their own thing that are semi-required.

Also yes, Mystic is REALLY powerful at healing. I was in a climactic laser fight, cast resist fire on myself, and laughed. They couldn't take the healer down at all, and with cover and smart play I could keep my team up astoundingly well.

I love unrestricted free archetype. It makes building characters so much more liberating. Builds come online faster, you get greater level of fidelity in character customization, and you don't really get that much power out of it.

I highly recommend it for anyone coming from PF1 who really liked tweaking characters every which way to get them just right.

It's by no means necessary to play the game, and some groups would be better off without it if only to streamline character gen and level ups.

Basically, if you group doesn't think about the game outside of the game, it's unlikely to be worth it.