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Cold Iron Blanch requires one hand to use and two actions to apply.

Silversheen requires two hands to use and one action to apply.

Is this intentional? Does the Silversheen just... come out of the bottle faster than the Cold Iron Blanch? Is the cap on the Cold Iron Blanch easier to open with one hand?

If a complex hazard's routine gives it 3 actions per turn, and each action is to make a ranged attack at a certain bonus, does it make 3 attacks at that bonus or does it suffer a multiple attack penalty on the second 2 attacks?

I don't understand how complex hazards roll initiative when triggered while already in encounter mode.

Suppose the players have already rolled initiative. We're on initiative count 15 and half the PCs have already taken their turn. Then the complex hazard's reaction is triggered. It takes its reaction, then rolls initiative.

Does it really go on the initiative it rolls? This leads to some bizarre outcomes.

For example, the hazard would rather get a 14 than a 16. On a 14, the hazard gets to do its routine almost immediately, basically as soon as the current player finishes their turn. On a 16, the hazard goes only after all PCs have had a chance to take their turns.

Is the initiative rolling only for when the hazard is triggered from exploration mode? Or is the hazard really in this strange position where lower initiative might be better?

I do not understand how the Wellspring Gnome feat works with First World Magic.

Choose arcane, divine, or occult. [...] Whenever you gain a primal innate spell from a gnome ancestry feat, change its tradition from primal to your chosen tradition.

Choose one cantrip from the primal spell list. You can cast this spell as a primal innate spell at will.

Supposing you choose "arcane", do you choose a cantrip from the primal list and cast it as arcane? Or do you choose a cantrip from the arcane spell list?

And does this cantrip serve as a prerequisite for First World Adept (which requires "at least one primal innate spell"?

The cracked dusty rose prism ioun stone from Pathfinder Campaign Setting: Seekers of Secrets (2009) costs 500 gp, and grants a +1 competence bonus to initiative. It really gets on my nerve that this item, from a PFS-centric book in 2009 in a larger section on ioun stones, is now a virtually standard buy for adventurers. I can understand items like the ring of protection, cloak of resistance, and so forth being commonplace, but does every adventurer really walk around with a cracked ioun stone?

As an alternative for my homebrew campaign, I'm thinking of making a slotted item that provides the same thing, a competence bonus to initiative checks. If a slotless +1 bonus is 500 gp, I figure a version that takes up a slot should be 250 gp for a +1 bonus, 1000 gp for a +2 bonus, and generally 250x^2 gp for a +x competence bonus to initiative.

Does this sound reasonable? Furthermore, what slot should it be? I'm thinking shoulders slot, or maybe neck slot. Definitely should be one of the good ones.

This spell is from the Advanced Class Guide, pp. 181-182:

School necromancy [emotion, fear, mind-affecting]; level bard 4, shaman 5, sorcerer/wizard 5, witch 5
Casting Time 1 standard action
Components V,S
Range close (25 ft. + 5 ft./2 levels)
Targets one or more living creatures (see text)
Duration 1 round/level
Saving Throw Fortitude negates; spell Resistance yes

Each round, you can target a single living creature of up to 9 HD and strike it with terrifying waves of power. If the target fails its saving throw, it becomes panicked for 1d4 rounds, and you gain 5 temporary hit points (which disappear after 1 hour). After the panic ends, the creature remains shaken for 10 minutes per caster level, and it automatically becomes panicked again if it comes within sight of you during that time.
These temporary hit points stack if they are from different creatures.

Question: What kind of action is it to target a new creature? Is it a swift action like eyebite, a free action like analyze dweomer, or a standard action to concentrate like implosion?

EDIT: Quoted the entire spell entry.

One of my players asked me this question, and I'm kind of interested in finding an answer. Suppose someone uses a polymorph effect, such as wild shape, to turn into a creature whose melee attack line includes elemental damage. The example is a Viper Vine - its melee attack line says

Melee bite +23 (2d6+8/19–20 plus 3d6 acid), 4 tentacles +21 (1d6+4 plus grab)

This acid damage is never explained, not under "Special Attacks" nor anywhere else in the stat block. So, suppose I used plant shape III to turn into a Viper Vine - am I granted a bite attack that does acid damage, or not?

Can a sylph ninja with the Cloud Gazer feat from Advanced Race Guide see through her own smoke bomb? Smoke is not precisely fog, mist, or cloud; but Smoke Bomb creates an non-magical effect like a smokestick, and a smokestick works like fog cloud.

Relevant rules:

Benefit: You can see through fog, mist, and clouds, without penalty, ignoring any cover or concealment bonuses from such effects. If the effect is created by magic, this feat instead triples the distance you can see without penalty.

Smoke Bomb (Ex): This ability allows a ninja to throw a smoke bomb that creates a cloud of smoke with a 15-foot radius. This acts like the smoke from a smokestick. The ninja can center this smoke on herself, or throw the bomb as a ranged touch attack with a range of 20 feet. Using this ability is a standard action. Each use of this ability uses up 1 ki point.

This alchemically treated wooden stick instantly creates thick, opaque smoke when burned. The smoke fills a 10-foot cube (treat the effect as a fog cloud spell, except that a moderate or stronger wind dissipates the smoke in 1 round). The stick is consumed after 1 round, and the smoke dissipates naturally after 1 minute.

This special ability can be placed only on melee weapons.

The magic weapon serves as a channel for the wielder's ki, allowing her to use her special ki attacks through the weapon as if they were unarmed attacks. These attacks include the monk's ki strike, quivering palm, and the Stunning Fist feat (including any condition that the monk can apply using this feat).

I've seen other threads agonizing over the fact that "special ki attacks" is vague as could be, but I haven't seen a specific response to my question. And that is this: While the Stunning Fist feat is called out specifically by this description, does it still count as a "special ki attack" if it's being used by someone who's not a monk and has no ki pool? Would, say, a fighter with the Stunning Fist feat be able to pick up a ki focus greatsword and Stunning Fist through it?

Have a couple of questions about feats from Ultimate Magic that apply to inquisitors. They seem to enhance inquisitor class features, but as feats, their interaction with other spells and magical effects seems strange.

Benefit: Once per day as a free action, you can think back about a single statement you heard in the last day and determine if it was a lie. This acts like the discern lies spell, but instead of affecting a creature, it affects a single statement a creature has made. For example, if the king told you, "My daughter is in the monster's dungeon" before you left to find her, as long as the king said that to you within the past day, you can use this feat to determine whether or not the king deliberately and knowingly lied to you when he made that statement.

In this example: does the king get a will save? If so, is it retroactive? What happens if the king was a bard who had glibness on when he made the statement, but not when you use the feat -- do you need a caster level check, or not? If the king had a bonus or penalty to will saves at the time, does he apply that when you use this feat? What if you use this after the king is dead?

Benefit: When using your detect alignment class feature, you may spend 3 rounds studying a creature within 60 feet. You cannot take any other actions while doing this. After that time has passed, you learn the alignment of the creature.

Do normal defenses against alignment detection, e.g. ring of mind shielding, undetectable alignment work against this feat?

Here's a homebrew spell I'm thinking of adding into my game world. What do you think about it, balance-wise? Is it too powerful/weak for a second level spell? Thanks for your thoughts!

Pinpoint Magic Missile

School evocation [force]; magus 2, sorcerer/wizard 2

CASTING

Casting Time 1 standard action
Components V, S

EFFECT

Range close (25 ft. + 5 ft./2 levels)
Targets one creature
Duration 1d4 rounds
Saving Throw Fortitude partial; Spell Resistance yes

DESCRIPTION

This spell is a specialized variant of magic missile, with its accuracy increased such that it can hit sensitive locations on its target’s body.

A single missile of magical energy darts forth from your fingertip and strikes its target, dealing 1d4+1 points of force damage plus 1d4+1 per two caster levels beyond first (maximum 5d4+5). The missile strikes unerringly, even if the target is in melee combat, so long as it has less than total cover or total concealment.

In addition, you may target specific parts of a creature, applying the blinded, deafened, or sickened condition to the target for 1d4 rounds, as you choose. A successful Fortitude save negates the condition, but not the damage. Creatures immune to precision-based damage, such as elementals and oozes (but not incorporeal creatures) are immune to this effect.

Objects are not damaged by the spell. This spell has only a 25% chance of affecting a target protected by a shield spell or similar effect which specifically negates magic missile attacks.

Mail of malevolence hangs in rags and tatters and acts as nonmagical chainmail to wearers who lack at least a moderate evil aura (Core Rulebook 266). When worn by a sufficiently evil character, it instead functions as +2 unrighteous chainmail (see page 123). Mail of malevolence does not bestow a negative level on good wearers.

The wearer of mail of malevolence gains SR 21, but only against spells with the good descriptor. In addition, whenever the wearer channels negative energy to harm living creatures, she heals a like amount of damage herself regardless of whether she is living or undead.

The question I have is about the part in bold. If the evil wearer of a mail of malevolence channels negative energy using of the Channel Smite feat, does she still heal that much damage? Or do you have to channel into an area in order to gain that benefit?

I'm a GM who has generally only run games for players who were relatively new, or not particularly concerned with character optimization. This game is going to be for a group of experienced, high-power players, and one of them has requested that it be run starting at a moderately high level like 12 (which means they'll have even more opportunity to craft killer PCs). If anyone has any tips for how I can adapt to a higher-powered group, they'd be much appreciated.

I do have a specific question as well. One of the players has said he wants to go gnome monk for the Bewildering Koan feat, which looks like this:

As a swift action, spend 1 point from your ki pool and make a Bluff check by asking a creature one of the impossible questions you ponder when meditating. If the creature fails its check, you choose whether it loses its next action or you gain a +2 bonus on all damage rolls you make against that creature for 1 round.

Is this broken or is it just me? It looks like it says the monk gets to shut down the boss every round at the cost of a ki point and a swift action. It wouldn't be hard to get an outsized bluff check, high enough to automatically beat anyone without full ranks of Sense Motive. I'm tempted to ban or nerf the feat, possibly making it a standard action or restricting it to once per minute or something. But I'm cautious about limiting the players. I'm trying to balance my fear of stifling their creativity or fun with my fear that they'll wipe the floor with anything I throw at them. I thank you for your advice.