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Another pseudo-option is have them play an Alchemist instead. You can take the discoveries alchemical zombie and boneshard bomb. They don't count as evil acts and boneshard bomb doesn't have a cost associated with it either. If they hit level 14 you can even get greater alchemical simulacrum which lets you create an army of any kind of undead you desire.
You'd need to also find a way to become immune to baleful polymorph since that would strip you of your critical hit immunity.
Thanks again my friends for helping me think this one out.
I try not to get pedantic like that. Otherwise the syringe spear does nothing since it says it injects the poison and no poison is type:inject. It's all inhaled, contact, ingested or injury. Strictly RAW it wouldn't work since even contact/injury requires that the weapon be coated. Syringe spear also came out before Alchemist was a thing. The next closest thing are touch injection and poisoners gloves. If we ever get a reprint of adventurer's armory I'm sure they'll clarify. Annnny day now.
There isn't looking like there will be a place to buy gear until, I dunno, like, after 6th Level. Is them just finding it through little micro-adventures not on the table? An abandoned cart is home to a monster. Hidden in a compartment under the driver seat is a dagger+1 or whatever. Or while camping next to a river someone will notice a glint in the bottom of the river. If they can manage to fish it out, it's a ring of protection +1! And so on.
Thank you for sharing your thoughts. It's pretty obvious syringe spear and infusions working is RAW. You can pour any liquid into the spear. Infusions are a liquid. And we know from poisoners gloves that infusions work when injected as an attack. My questions were regards to damage spell interaction, throwing weapons and flavor text.
I don't believe brew potion enters into this at all. They're using alchemical infusions which work in a syringe spear since it's basically just a ranged non-touch version of poisoners gloves. For stacking: From what I understand sources of damage can always work. The only exception to this is bleed damage which is explicitly called out and the explicit 'on fire' condition. For quick draw: Quick draw just allows you to draw a weapon as a free action instead of a move action. If he has 6 spears in his efficient quiver and each is preloaded with detonate, he should be able to draw and throw them. My question is has anyone ever solved the "In Pathfinder, does a spear take two hands to throw?" question. I ~believe~ throwing weapons are always considered one handed with the sole exception of chucking a two handed weapon that isn't a throwing weapon (IE: throwing a great sword).
So here's an interesting interaction of rules that I'd like help sorting out. --- Question 1: Would multiple sources of detonate stack? The spell duration is 1 round, but the damage is instantaneous when it goes off. My reading is instantaneous damage always stacks. --- Question 2: Syringe spear is a thrown weapon. As a baseline it's a two handed weapon, but from what I'm reading throwing a thrown weapon is typically considered, baseline, to be a one handed affair. With quick draw you're allowed to make full iterative attacks. So if say you have a 2 regular attacks from bab, haste and TWF you'd be able to throw 4 of these things in a single full round attack, correct? Or can you not TWF a thrown weapon that's 2 handed when used in melee? --- Extra credit question 3: From what I understand when infusions are used and how weirdly they interact with personal range spells, generally we change the word 'you' in personal spells to 'the target' as you would for a touch range spell. Because of how detonate works and is worded, this means that the target would be able to decide, when it explodes, what type of damage it does since that is determined not when the spell is made but when it detonates. But if you have no idea what you were just hit with...how would you know what element to explode with? I'm thinking allow a knowledge:arcana and if they succeed they can pick, but if they fail just randomize? --- Situation: Party has someone who is built for throwing weapons. Alchemist has more spell slots than he knows what to do with. They plan on buying a handful of syringe spears and filling them with infusions of detonate. I immediately said no to Skinsend. No save CC would make balancing encounters a nightmare. However, Detonate I see no problem with in limited fashion provided it doesn't break any rules. Thanks in advance!
I think instead of creating a succubus with crafting feat, why not create a succubus for profane gift and another random simulacrum with crafting feat? Thematic reasons mostly. It would be fitting with his character which is why I'm entertaining this mess of an idea in the first place.
Good point. I'll make sure he has it be more than just a "10 feats for the price of two" thing.
Thank you to everyone for the thoughts and feedback. I appreciate you taking the time to respond to me. Actually, I believe the master craftsman feat allows you to let you use your Craft(X) skill ranks as a substitute for caster level. Granted, that's another one of those vaguely worded feats that's going to be left up to my interpretation. For the most part I trust this player to not abuse it. This thread has encouraged me to make it a monumental task though.
Thank you kindly. For what it's worth, for simulacrum you don't need a piece of the target. That's only clone. It sounds like there's no reason I can't stat a custom Succubus and let him make a simulacrum of it (at half HD). The question at this point becomes how to go about doing it in a way that is fun and interesting. Thanks again my friends!
I guess the more condensed form of my question is, is there anything that would stop me as the GM from making a monster with character levels for a PC with simulacrum to copy.
I'm looking for help in preparing myself in advance for counter-arguments. The table has 2 people who are pretty open to whatever, but 2 pretty hefty rules lawyers. They're good peoples just, y'know. We do try to play RAW as closely as we can to avoid things spiraling and arguments coming up. Parties alchemist just hit 14 and took Greater Alchemical Simulacrum with my blessing that he doesn't try to abuse it to break the game open. His plan is to grow a succubus (for the usual profane gift cheese) and I'm okay with it. +2 int at level 14 isn't going to break the game and honestly it kinda fits his character. However, he asked me if the rule for monster advancement is DM only. Basically, he would like me to allow him to treat GAS like it's weird science and not a magical effect which...I'm also inclined to allow. He wants to create a simulacrum of a Succubus who just happens to dabble in alchemy and stick her with a necklace of adaptation in his portable hole where she can sit there with crafting feats cranking out preserving flasks (and occasionally take her out to dinner to creep out the rest of the party). Given that he could just take leadership and accomplish basically the same thing, and that as vague and abuseable as simulacrum can be, I'm again...inclined to allow it. In fact, I was thinking of 'soft house ruling' that at 14 he gets GAS but can't really use it as he wants but if he takes leadership at 15, then I'd let him build his Frankenuccubus. A 3 feat tax (alchemical simulacrum, greater alchemical simulacrum, leadership) for some roleplay potential and half off preserving flasks seems pretty reasonable to me. However, I also don't want to upset the more rules lawyery people at the table and am hoping to get ahead of any problems they may point out with all of this at our next session. Obviously "I'm the DM, what I say goes" along with the "It's my house, my materials and my pizza" are strong arguments but I want to avoid going that route. Is there anything -obviously- against the rules I'm missing?
Feat wise there isn't much that is axe-exclusive. For some 'okay that was cool' flavor you could have your knight carry a few throwing axes. Then take the sliding axe throw feat. Allows you to ignore shield AC (at a -2 ranged penalty) and if your target is fleeing or flat footed, you get a free trip attempt. Not practical by any means, but who builds only practical characters? xD
Usually when this question comes up it becomes a discussion about how staggered and nauseated conditions treat actions as sacrosanct. If the rules don't explicitly state that one action can be swapped for another, then you can't. Nauseated for example doesn't allow the use of any action other than a move action. The existence of staggered which explicitly calls out you can still use a swift action with your either/or action, implies that swift actions cannot be swapped for a move action. All of this ultimately implies that you're limited to how much 'effort' you can put into actions during a combat round and not just the time they take. Remember, a swift action is identical to a free action except that it takes more 'effort', not more time. How much effort you can put into a combat round is never stated anywhere so you can't really determine anything directly from that. Just that different action types are not meant to be swapped unless the rules explicitly state you can. So from a RAW, MS is correct. So while you could use, say, swift alchemy as a move action instead of a swift action because it goes from move->swift->free, you can't use it as a standard action. Likewise, since a spring loaded wrist sheath is a swift action with no progression, you can't change it to a move or standard action instead. --- That being said from a GM standpoint I'd probably allow a swift action to take the place of a standard action, but not a move action. I would just apply the "Is this dumb though?" sanity check like when a player tries to make a Simulacrum of a demi-god
Note that you're pretty much also forced to wear a ring of sustenance otherwise you have to ask your party to sit there for 3 hours every morning while you make vials.
Ah, the way we ruled it was PC's were an edge case because they could exist eventually and because prognostication exists in Pathfinder, you can create a copy of your future self. The downside of DM'ing for a psychologist. Yeah, half-HD it is then.
Keep in mind strafe bomb still provokes as a thrown attack if anybody is threatening your square. Also worth noting is there is some conflict on whether or not alchemical weapons works the way we often think it does. RAW, alchemical weapon just adds some bonus dice to your attack. You also don't get the int or concentrated splash bonus. The only ruling we have otherwise that it ~does~ work is some guy claims that the author of the grenadier archtype said it does. There's never been official confirmation of that and it conflicts with Paizo's rulings on (ability bonus) stacking. So if you want to nerf yourself, then just be extra rules lawyery on yourself and limit the alchemical weapon bonus to 4d6. Still a nice bonus, but hardly OP at level 13 compared to the nonsense a pure bomber alchemist can put out.
If you just want to be small for aesthetic reasons, you could also just as your DM if it's okay if your character is under the effects of a permanencied reduce person spell. I did that with my Strix. Cost about ~3000 gold and now I'm a tiny flying bombing machine.
Very clear and concise. Half HD/levels and appropriate hp. Important to note that the Simulacrum spell allows you to create something that has up to twice your HD, then divide by half. With greater alchemical simulacrum for example, you can create a copy of yourself that has twice your HD, but then cut in half, so equal to your HD. So I would rule that Doppelganger Simulacrum has your full HD and HP. It also follows in power progression. Lesser Simulacrum lasts a short time and only half your HD. Doppleganger is your HD and lasts as long as you, but only one body can be active at a time. Greater Simulacrum let's you create copies of yourself that can all be active at the same time. An army of yourself. This is why most tables I've played at bans the use of the spell or at least severely limits what's allowed with it. |
