Zaros Liserii's page

Simple question, I hope:

Does the Kineticist's ability to Metamagic Empower their blast apply to the base ability damage only (Xd6+X+CON)

-Or-

Or does it apply to the final damage including modifiers from Elemental Overflow, abilities like Fire's Fury and feats like Point-Blank Shot?

Thanks in advance for your help in answering this.

Please make alignment fully optional in Starfinder. In other words, do not make classes that require a certain alignment (they can still follow a code of behavior), do not make spells that function based off of alignment (instead use friend/foe).

The alignment system is a net negative. It creates more arguments at the table than anything it offers in return. It's an unsolvable problem because, as any forum post on the topic demonstrates, we each have widely differing opinions of what good, evil, lawful and chaotic mean and where each begins and ends. Its a part of the game that doesn't need to be there.

Thank you!

There is an inherent problem in the "math" of Pathfinder/d20.

Imagine you have two level 3 fighters. One has a +7 to hit and the other a +13. As GM, you've got one number, Armor Class, that's going to matter how much they hit the monsters. You've got to make the AC too easy for one of them, or too hard for the other.

There is no downside to designing your melee hero to be the +13 guy, just "optimal" choices. The "math" of the game mostly reinforces the idea that the rules reward the "optimized" more than they reward the +7 guy, because good role-playing is not really stat-dependent, but the combat is.

Maybe one way to make Starfinder better is to make stats and combat scale less linearly, and more like rock-paper-scissors? What if as you scale up one value to get better, another value(s) diminish slightly. Or put another way, what if you have a "Pool" to allocate between accuracy, damage and number of attacks.

Using the example of the two fighters, maybe the +7 to hit guy has that +7 because he hits for more damage, or attacks more often, whereas the +13 guy got his very high accuracy in exchange for slower, less damaging attacks.

In Pathfinder, the +13 guy is strictly better than the +7 guy. In Starfinder, maybe they both can have a place.

Thanks for reading.

Easy Question, I hope:

If someone throws a weapon, such as a dagger at an enemy using their buckler-equipped hand, does that ranged attack suffer the -1 to hit penalty from the Buckler?

It seems clear in the case of hand-to-hand fighting, less so for thrown attacks.

Thanks in advance.

Dear Paizo community,
I am a DM about to start the Iron Gods campaign for my players. One of them thought it would be really cool to add a random oddity or quirk to their characters, in homage to the strange qualities you could add in many old school rpgs, such as fallout. I love the idea.

I've come up with a few examples, but I could really use the communities help and creativity with making many more! Ideally, it would be awesome to have enough to fill out a d100 table. These quirks can run the gamut of terrible, fantastic, strange, useful, burdensome, interesting and everything in between.

Here is what I came up with so far, can you write more of your own for my group (and anyone else) to use? Thank you so much!

Examples:
Quirks and Oddities

Bird-Boned “You get a broken jaw from a stiff slap, and falling down stairs is a recurring nightmare for you. At least in the right wind, and with a running start, you feel like you can almost fly.”
Benefit(s): You weigh 30% less than normal; You gain a +5 bonus on Jump checks; You gain a +2 bonus on Fly checks; You take 1d6 less falling damage than usual
Drawback(s): You have a weakness to bludgeoning damage (50% more)

Hemophiliac “You always bruised easily and your nosebleeds would last for hours. Your blood is thin and runny, and every time you cut yourself it’s always a struggle to get the wound to stop bleeding.”
Benefit(s): None
Drawback(s): All bleed effects continue for 2 rounds after they would have otherwise stopped.

Hater of Doors: “What is best in life? The sound of splintering wood, the crushing of portals, and the lamentation of former door owners. For some reason, you’ve always hated closed doors, likely due to some unremembered childhood trauma. Maybe you’re just crazy. Now you treat all closed doors as a mortal enemy and a personal affront. You’ve spent a lot of time in jail for property damage. “
Benefit(s): You roll twice on strength checks to force open a door, taking the better result; You always deal a critical hit when attempting to sunder doors.
Drawback(s): If you ever try and fail to open a closed door in one shot, (via sunder or strength check), you become shaken as you lose faith in yourself. This penalty lasts until you successfully defeat a door in one shot.

Large Lungs: “You have lungs like bellows, and they have served you well every time you went swimming or diving. If you could only breathe fire, you’d be the mightiest dragon.”
Benefit(s): You can hold your breath twice as long as usual; Any breath attacks you make have their cone or line effect increased by 50%
Drawback(s): In combat and other physically exciting situations, roll a d20 at the start of your turn, on a result of 1, you momentarily pass out. You become prone and staggered for your turn, and drop what you were holding.

Thrill-seeker: “It’s better to burn out, than to fade away. You’ve always felt that life is only thrilling when you’re riding the edge of death. Safe is boring, you live for risk.’
Benefit(s): If you’re below 50% hit points, gain a +1 bonus on your d20 rolls.
Drawback(s): If you’re at full hit points, take a -1 penalty on your d20 rolls.

Odd Glow: “There are places in the world where you simply start glowing like a faint will-o-wisp, usually in the Numerian Wastes or next to technological items and scrap.”
Benefit(s): Whenever you’re within an area of radiation, you give off dim light in a 10’ radius.
Drawback(s): None

Free Fated: “You’ve always felt like you had an extraordinary will and an ability to control your own fate, to bend luck to your bidding. Maybe you’re just extraordinarily confident.”
Benefit(s): You can control your fate to re-roll any d20 roll as a free action, keeping the better result. Doing so earns you a Debt Token.
Drawback(s): The DM can use a Debt Token to force you to re-roll any d20 roll, keeping the worse result. You cannot Control your Fate while you have a Debt Token.

Alcoholic: “You’ve hit the bottle so long you’ve nearly forgotten what being sober is like.”
Benefit(s): You can consume twice the alcohol as usual without becoming drunk.; You gain a +2 diplomacy bonus in bars, taverns, parties and with fellow connoisseurs.; You gain a +1 bonus on saves vs. poison
Drawback(s): You take a -1 penalty on saves vs. disease; You must consume alcohol each day or you take 2 points of Constitution damage from withdrawal. You are too far gone to quit without it killing you.

Light Sleeper: “You awaken at the slightest sound, at the gentlest breeze or even a shadow passing over you. It’s a curse and you envy others restful sleep.”
Benefit(s): You automatically awaken when anything at all is wrong. You can wear earplugs and a sleeping mask to intentionally lose this benefit.
Drawback(s): You gain the fatigued condition for the following day, due to your inability to get proper sleep. You can wear earplugs and a sleeping mask to intentionally lose this drawback.

Hodor: “Some people are fat, some people are big boned, but you’re clearly just a small giant.”
Benefit(s): You are treated as one size bigger for purposes of CMD, BAB, AC and Natural Attack Dice
Drawback(s): You have never squeezed into anywhere, and you never will.

Know-It-All: “You know a lot of useful information, odd pieces of knowledge and obscure trivia. The problem is that when you don’t know something, you just give it your best guess instead of admitting your ignorance.”
Benefit(s): You roll two dice when making knowledge checks.
Drawback(s): The DM secretly and randomly picks which of your two rolls is used.

Heartbomb: “At one point in your life you’ve had a particularly critical need to implant an explosive into your body that would explode if you died. Eventually, the need passed, and the bomb stayed.”
Benefit(s): If anyone kills you, they’ll die too. You bomb explodes for 10d6 fire damage in a 30’ radius. Anyone affected can take half damage with a Reflex Save DC of 15 + your character level.
Drawback(s): There won’t be much left of your body for a nice funeral.

I was asked for a ruling on the Prismatic Sphere and Prismatic Wall spells from one of my players, and I need some advice.

The question is whether all (ranged, magic, melee) attacks targeting the wizard suffer the effects of the seven colors, or just melee attacks passing through the sphere or wall. The spell text from Prismatic Sphere states that "Other creatures that attempt to attack you or pass through suffer the effects of each color, one at a time."

My natural inclination is to assume this means or was intended to mean melee attacks, even ones from large creatures with a lot of reach. However, my player believes this means the prismatic sphere should also affect an archer attempting to shoot his wizard, or someone trying to cast a targeted spell at his wizard. I wanted to get a second, third and fourth opinion from fellow GMs and players. Thank you in advance for taking the time to reply.

I am looking for some advice from the community who have played at tables where the PCs and monsters had maximum HP per hit die. I am considering adding this feature to the next campaign I run, but I am unsure as to how the Pros and Cons work out in actual play.

The Pros that entice me to the idea:
1. Less chance of quick TPK
2. Less rocket tag from either side / Rebalance of damage vs. health
3. Tactics take on slightly more importance
4. Healing is less of an afterthought

The Cons seem to be:
1. Battles will last longer in game rounds and in table time
2. Healing takes up more resources

I can take some steps to help mitigate the length of the encounters, such as limiting how many people roll up characters with pets/mounts/familiars/summons. But is the fundamental trade off generally positive or generally negative?

Either way, thanks for taking the time to reply!

Looking for a NJ gaming/hobby store that will be running the pathfinder adventure card game season. I want to try the organized play and see how it goes. My commute takes me from the Maplewood / Union area down to Freehold / Jackson area. If you are a store running a game anywhere reasonably near the above areas, or know of one, please let me know.

Thanks,
Paul

Just started browsing through this AP which I hope to DM after our current campaign ends.

The first concern that hit me is that the sci if elements and tech will hardly be the "star" of the campaign if the party has arcane casters. A laser pistol is less special when the party shoots scorching rays already, a jet pack isn't special when you can cast fly, and a transporter is just a bad version of teleport.

So I'm thinking of limiting the group to martial and divine classes. Not that magic isn't around, but having it in the party might make the campaign less flavorful. Good idea, bad idea?

Good Day all:

I have a Drow player in the party as well as an illusionist who enjoys using the spell "Mass Dazzling Blade". One of the effects of the spell is that a person can discharge it to blind or dazzle a foe.

The spell is an illusion(pattern). The text states that the "wielder of a dazzling blade can discharge the spell into a blinding burst of silvery light". An adjacent opponent is the target of the spell.

Q: Would a Drow employing this spell against a foe also blind himself with it? (Would this spell effect count as being exposed to bright light?)

While we are on the subject, what else would blind a light blind creature?
1. A fireball spell
2. An alchemist's bombs exploding
3. The muzzle flash of a musket being fired
4. A lightning bolt spell
5. The appearance of a brightly lit summoned creature, such as a fire elemental?
6. The breath weapon of a red dragon?

I'm curious mainly as to what the rules-correct answers are to the above, but am also happy with hearing general opinions on how everyone else has ruled at their tables.

Thank you

I have a trap in mind: A wall in a dungeon moves to push characters over a steep drop.

Fail Save: Fall
Make Save: You manage to hold on to the wall and are now dangling over a sheer drop.

After 3 rounds, the wall retracts into its original position.
What would be an appropriate check to "hold on" for 3 rounds, if you didn't want to risk using climb to move.

I'm thinking a DC 10 Strength check
(+1 for every 100 pounds of weight you are supporting)
(+1 for every round you've been holding on)

Does that sound reasonable or are there rules for this sort of thing already?

Thanks in advance.

Hey, new DM here and I need some good advice.

Situation is as such: I'm running the Kingmaker AP and the group has just defeated the Stag Lord and captured his fort. The group found the Stag Lord's helm but unlike the AP, I decided to make it an intelligent artifact that will bend one character to the will of Lamashtu and against the followers of Erastil. They don't know this, all they know is that it is a magical item that radiates (Strong ALL) and has some amazing abilities (think Predator) Why? Because interesting story.

The group emailed me their concerns about my inexperience and overpowered munchkin items. Fair enough. They asked for a vote to change the item back to how it's written in the adventure. I'm letting them vote on it, because if they're that worried, well, they should have their concerns addressed.

It seems silly to go, "just trust me", because I'm new to DMing and I haven't earned their confidence yet. It seems equally silly to reveal the secret of the item and spoil the surprise.

So do I revert it back to a mundane item and forget that part of the storyline I planned or do I revert the item and KEEP the cursed nature of the helm?? I'm concerned that the second option will be viewed as DM revenge.

Perhaps there is a better third option?

Thanks in advance,
Paul

Need some opinions on fleshing out a Cossack character.
Where would be the most appropriate homeland for such a character? Mendev?
I have the character using a scimitar and pistol, and being an excellent horseman.
What other feats, skills, equipment etc would you all suggest to fully represent the flavor of such a character and the Cossacks raiding culture?

I plan on making him a rogue with a level of gunslinger for just a touch of firearms. Would you also take levels of ranger or barbarian?

Thanks in advance.