Zedrin's page

This story is so insanely infuriating. I can't believe how malicious and unfair bankruptcy law is.

I hope some of the smaller companies that were screwed over by this are able to get by as well.

I'm pretty disappointed to see almost nothing from the Errata suggestions thread got addressed other than the Champ runes, which probably isn't even because of that thread since it got a thread of its own and was also widely discussed elsewhere. Obviously no one expected even a quarter of what was brought up there to be addressed, but almost nothing is just sad and calls into question if Paizo rules staff were even aware of its existence.

To be clear, that thread was created at the request and suggestion of a Paizo staff member to create a centralized place for the rules team to review community concerns regarding confusing, contradictory, and or egregiously unbalanced content. Paizo literally asked people to do it. The thought that all of it might have gone ignored despite bringing up many issues more pressing than almost anything touched today is just... kind of depressing honestly.

Seconding this; the changes here otherwise feel kinda underwhelming. I seriously expected more for both of the Player Cores especially, and more stuff relating to game balance/QoL.

The fact that Exemplar Dedication wasn't even mentioned is probably the biggest disappointment.

Finoan wrote:

Lia Wynn wrote:

I do not think it needs an errata.

It does not work on people to begin with.

It specifically targets animals and is a once-per-day ability with a minor bonus. Basically, it lets you, at level 5, give that cat, or dog, or cow, or whatever a combat bonus.

I would also not allow it to be used on an AC/eidolon/awakened animal PC.

Awakened Animal characters are not people. They are not Animals any more either (they have the Beast trait instead), so the effect wouldn't work on them. Beast Eidolon also wouldn't work since they also have the Beast trait instead of the Animal trait.

But there is nothing that prevents the ability from being used on an Animal Companion with the Animal trait. There is technically nothing that prevents it from being used on a Familiar either, but the Familiar still wouldn't be able to use Strike with the improved attack.

So if you wouldn't want it being used on an Animal Companion, then the ability needs errata.

However, is there an actual balance problem with using the ability on an Animal Companion? It effectively gives a 1/day Runic Body effect (including the rules language of making the target's unarmed attacks +1 Striking unarmed attacks) that is only usable on the party's Animal Companion.

Am I missing something? That doesn't seem overpowered to me.

From a mechanical perspective, I do not think there is an issue.

There might be since ACs do get bonuses from progression naturally. But, as Yuri pointed out, the writing of the ability does seem to minimize any balance issues.

However, the reason I would not allow it to be used on ACs is the intent behind the ability. As Yuri also pointed out, and as the ability itself says, it's meant to be used on other animals. It's not *just* a game about numbers, it's also a game about story-telling, so the intent behind an ability is just as important as a +1, and this Ancestry Feat has a...

The thing is, this is a level 5 ancestry feat. It's specifying a Ghost Touch benefit that technically can never be achieved--so why is it included in the first place? Generally if something like that is mentioned, the intention is that it can be accessed. (I guess maybe if you used Runic Body first and THEN this, but then... why is this a level 5 feat? That is a lot of hoops to jump through.)

If it was just supposed to give an animal (companion or wild) a +1 benefit to attack and SOMETIMES a striking benefit, there's better ways to word that, but also that is pretty weak for a level 5 feat that is limited to a single heritage.

Book: Tian Xia Character Guide
Feat: Unassuming Heroes (Leshy ancestry feat)
Issue: This feat applies a +1 striking benefit to an animal companion or NPC animal (similar to Runic Body), and grants them the ghost touch rune if they already have a +1 striking attack. However, these creatures do not normally interact with / cannot interact with +1 striking effects.

The problem is, unlike with players, animal companions cannot benefit from item bonuses, and neither of these types of creatures technically use "striking" runes--instead just gaining damage dice from their level or native progression.

Do NPC animals with 2 damage dice just gain a +1 to hit and can never gain ghost touch? Mature animal companions already have 2 dice themselves, but it's not a striking rune and they can't benefit from item bonuses, so does this feat do nothing for them?

I think the intent with the feat was at least obvious, but it should probably instead say something like:

"For the next 1 minute, one of the animal’s unarmed attacks gains an increase in its total number of damage dice, from 1 to 2. If it already had 2 or more damage dice, it instead gains the effects of the ghost touch rune."

I'm not 100% sure where to report an issue that probably needs errata, but I did wanna try and bring attention to a bit of an oddity I found with the following Leshy ancestry feat.

Unassuming Heroes (level 5)

Source Tian Xia Character Guide pg. 42
Frequency once per day
Access peachchild leshy heritage
You have a talent for making friends through simple kindness, often among stray animals or other creatures that people tend to overlook, and your inherent magic can make these acts take on additional power. As an Interact action, you can feed a small treat, such as a millet dumpling, to an animal that has an indifferent or better attitude toward you. For the next 1 minute, one of the animal’s unarmed attacks becomes a +1 striking unarmed attack. If it was already a +1 striking attack, it instead gains the effects of the ghost touch rune.

The issue with this feat how it's applied to two entities that don't actually (or wholly) interact with a +1 striking bonus.

NPCs meanwhile operate on a different set of rules, and likewise just have their attack bonuses factored in; if they already have two damage dice, then technically this would give them a +1 to hit on top of it, but that throws into question if it'd ever grant them a ghost touch effect. If it doesn't, then the ghost touch effect actually can't ever be applied to an animal, companion or NPC.

I think the intention for this feat is pretty obvious, though, and it instead was supposed to be:

For the next 1 minute, one of the animal’s unarmed attacks is increased from one damage die to two. If it already had two damage dice, it instead gains the effects of the ghost touch rune.

Removing the rune requirement/reference. As is it seems more like just using the wording for the Runic Body spell, but applying it to something you wouldn't normally put it on.

Apologies if this is not the right place to discuss or report this thing, I'm not exactly sure where to bring up stuff that calls for an errata.

Player Core 2
Class: Alchemist
Issue: Quick vials / field vials are notably action taxing, especially for the toxicologist.

Outside of bomber, thanks to how good Quick Bomber is, Alchemist still has a lot of action economy headaches to face. For Toxicologist in particular, while it's only 1 action to apply a poison, it's still 1 action to draw or create a poison, which means it's still basically a 2 action activity. (Compare that to Rogue's Poison Weapon feat which allows them to draw and apply a poison all as one action. I feel like you could make an alchemist variant of this feat as well, though I'm not really suggesting that here.)

The real pain point however is field vials: the rules allow a quick alchemy poison to last for 10 minutes once it's applied, but for using a field vial, the poison will only last until the end of your current turn. This means unless you can only use this feature if you can dedicate all 3 actions to a single strike.

For other subclasses, their field vial use is effectively 2 actions: they make the vial, and then use it. For toxicologist however, it has to be created, applied, then struck with, a 3 action commitment on a single turn.

Action compression is one solution, but another small fix might be to allow the injury poison from a field vial to last until the end of the player's next turn, so they can spread the action cost across two turns instead of having to commit all 3 in one round, sorta like how spellstrike works for the Magus.

(I actually would be interested in some more radical changes too to help shore up the non-bomber subclasses, but I feel like suggesting the ability to make Quick Alchemy - create consumable a free action 1/round, even just for items of your own research field might be too radical of an errata for some people. It would effectively give everyone a type of quick bomber benefit that's tailored to their subclass, though.)

I was considering Kemnebi at first as well, but my main concern was if he'd be able to much more directly interfere with things because he technically had a minion of his in the party. I'd've had to come up with a way for her to resist his control, since he takes notice of the party about halfway into the adventure.

The character can be turned into a vampire via a ritual, instead of being a spawned vampire.

Ultimately the player decided to actually start living, with plans to become a vampire later, so we'll see how that shakes out!

I have one player who wants to play a vampire, and I'm trying to see if there's any good tie-ins for them as the one who turned them among the NPCs in the book.

I've skimmed through all 6 books but haven't read them in depth, so the options I've noticed so far are:
Tobias Highridge (the tax collector in Sallowshore, a fairly low-stakes option)
Lord Zthni (the mealy but charismatic Blood Lord staying at Harrowhouse, I could see this one being funny)
Hyrune (a big bad vampire, the PC would have slipped out from their gaze until they went to confront him)
Kemnebi (the big bad himself)

The thing about Kemnebi is, if he knows the characters are after him, how much agency would a vampire spawn of his have in retaliating against him? For Hyrune, my strategy would be that, when Geb indirectly instructs them to hunt him down, he'd also subtly grant the vampire PC a way to resist Hyrune's compulsions so they can hunt him down.

I'd plan to use something similar for Kemnebi eventually, if that's whom they wanted to go with, but prior to Geb getting involved that boon wouldn't exist. Does Kemnebi directly intervene with the player affairs to the point where it'd derail things, if they could just compel a PC to be their servant? Do you have any ideas on how you would address this as well? I'd want the threat of compulsion and sabotage to be there, but I also want the player to feel like they can dodge it or fight back against it, but if it's too much I'll opt for another option.

And, just to check, are there also any other NPCs that'd be good candidates as a vampire spawn's master? Either that are cooperative with the party or if the party winds up taking them down/overcoming them.

(I've also kept most of the npcs' relevance and plot twists a secret: the player only knows the NPCs' standing and general personality, so no worries there.)

I'm interested to see if they do a heritage for Vanara, considering Sun Wukong's a deity and there are vanara in Tian Xia (albeit, very culturally different from the ones we're more familiar with).

Overall I love the changes I've seen, though from what I've read, I kinda feel like Quick Alchemy should've been split into two separate features rather than one with two separate actions (Create Consumable and Quick Vial). The Quick Vial option is a little confusing at a glance when compared with Versatile Vials, and could've been its own thing of "You create a temporary vial that can be thrown like a Versatile vial, or be used with your research field."

Either way, ALCHEMIST IS BACK, can't wait to rebuild one of my earliest characters. I like how the versatile vials regenerate over time: I imagine it as sometimes gathering things as you go about your business, and sometimes letting reactions happen as you work. Imagine a Chirugeon treating wounds for a sorcerer and sneakily putting a few drops of their blood into a vial to prepare a new one.

This sounds rad, I've never really considered making an oracle before, but the revamp sounds a lot more straightforward and fun to interact with.

I feel like a chart that shows the differences would help a lot. A flowchart or one of those checkmark comparison charts.

Trying to wrap my head around this, are the following statements accurate?

-Infinite is more tied to OGL content and can still use OGL references
-Infinite is more lore influenced, and can refer to other works published under Infinite
-Infinite's license can't be modified to be more open due to agreements with other marketplaces (re: DTRPG).
-Even if it could, replacing Infinite with ORC would mean people wouldn't be able to use the OGL content.

-ORC has been removed from OGL influences, but as a result it can't use said OGL references.
-ORC is more mechanics and rules oriented. What lore it does use is no longer OGL derived.
-ORC can refer to anything else that is open and non-exclusive

-ORC's main incompatibility with Infinite is ORC requires/grants non-exclusivity, while Infinite requires exclusivity. You'd imagine that the exclusivity would take precedence if you tried to use both, but I'd take it there wouldn't be an advantage to doing so (which is why you can't).

Also I guess one question I also have, if you wish to use the world of Golarion specifically, to what degree would either license apply, if at all?

The burst feat feels like a telegraphed AOE that pleases my MMO-playing lizard brain

^ Noble goal, but unfortunately Paizo has already made clear they aren't answering public questions in a stream like they originally intended and publicized when this thread was created. Inexplicably, they don't lock this thread even when people suggest that, despite admitting they don't plan to repond to topics raised here.

It seems some of your questions have been answered by other posters, but question would be why they need be posted here, as opposed to more topically focused threads. If you can find existing threads via forum search then great, and in many cases you can find that somebody already anwered your question, or if it hasn't been discussed yet you can create new thread. And Paizo developer staff do read the rules discussions, so the extent they are interested in addresing an issue in future Errata/FAQ, it's not particularly necessary to post here as opposed to normal rules threads.

Good to know, tbh this was my first time posting to the forums so I didn't know the history of this thread. I had searched and seen a few other posts on these topics, but as they didn't reach conclusions, and with the assumption Paizo was still reading this pinned post it felt fitting to ask here. None of the threads I saw came to a consensus on most of these questions so 'answered' kinda gets a bit subjective, plus I didn't wanna necro threads that had a lot of heated discussion. Making yet another thread entirely for it feels redundant as a result.

At the very least, my table knows how we plan to rule on each of these questions, but it would be nice to get some sort of official clarification. Maybe if they ever do live QnA's as part of their streams I might be able to catch one of those to ask something, though I'm not up to speed on most social media stuff from Paizo so I dunno if they even do that.

Plausible enough and might be correct: Maybe we'll see something for it when the book gets errata.

Is the APG slated to get an errata? If that's the case then I have a feeling all these questions will be answered when that releases.

Sorry but asking it in this list isn't going to remove the debate.

Yeah, hence why I'm kinda hoping that Paizo staff might see the question and answer it in stream (assuming they still do that), as the threads I've seen just run in circles endlessly and can get pretty heated. I feel like the familiars need a bit of an errata just for clarity's sake.

Until it gets any official clarification, it's probably gonna just be up to GM interpretation from table to table. I know that regardless of public consensus, in the games I'm in the GM's allowing for the added flexibility, just cause item management is kinda painful otherwise for Alchemists if you're not focusing on bombs. It doesn't feel like it's upset any balance yet.

I appreciate people giving their thoughts on the questions though.

I have a few questions on familiars. I've seen tons of debates on these but never any actual definitive answers.

1) Does valet work with independent? Valet states that when you command your familiar, it uses its two actions to transfer up to two items into your hand as a free action. However, the way it's worded makes it seem sorta vague if the command is required to gain the use of valet, or if it hinges upon your familiar's ability to simply act. Meanwhile Independent refers to Command with a proper noun, referring to the command action, while Valet dose not, which is why there's speculation that Valet's may just more be flavor text.

That all said--I don't feel like one worn item quickdraw a turn is game-breaking (and it's a way to alleviate the terrible action economy woes for non-bomber alchemists), so I feel like there could be intent for them to potentially work together.

2) Can familiars with manual dexterity use and Activate items, magical or mundane? It's stated in the companion item rules that animals can never Activate items, which is a general trait. Familiars are described as (usually) animals that have become something more. If they cannot because they are still animals, then does that mean specific non-animal familiars or leshy familiars can do so? Or does this refer just to companion magic items?

3) Poison reservoir specifies you must have a homunculus familiar. Does this require a specific familiar, or is it a flavorful way to describe an alchemical familiar? Homunculi aren't listed as specific familiars, but also aren't mentioned at all in the Alchemical Familiar feat, so if it's the prior it feels like a weird limitation.