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I haven't picked up the book yet, but looking through discussions, it seems like the Social Talents all make you popular, and probably something like an aristocrat.

So, does that mean there are no ways to make Peter Parker, Clark Kent, or anyone else with a day job?

Did the devs go so hard into the "social butterfly" thing that there aren't Social Talents for mixing in with the dregs of society, or your average layman?

'Cause railroading players into making the Scarlett Pimpernel wouldn't exactly make me thrilled to pick up the book.

But if the Social Talents are wide enough that you can make characters from any walk of life, that'd be far more useful.

Reading through the Final Thoughts thread for the Vigilante Playtest, the suggestion came up to just out-and-out separate Dual Identity from the Vigilante, and make it a separate subsystem.

Someone said that characters choosing a Dual Identity wouldn't receive Traits & Drawbacks, and instead would receive a Dual Identity.

So... yeah, okay. I can kinda see that.

What would games look like if you took Dual Identity rules as-is, and made Dual Identity a general "super-archetype" like Mythic Paths that can be added to any character?

If you did away with Specializations (since that quality would now be covered by normal Class Levels), and simply gained a Social Talent at 1st Character Level, 2nd Level, 4th Level, and every other Level thereafter, would Dual Identity at least be worth considering using then?

Am I a "Fullmetal" Alchemist?

...

I'll see myself out.

So, Chakras as-printed in the Occult Adventures are... not... very... goo- okay, they're godawful.

They require way too much effort to get anything out of them and they come online too slowly in a fight to ever be worth it.

So, here's an alternate system:

CHAKRAS

Chakras are floodgates through an intelligent creature's body, through which Ki flows.

These Chakras are usually kept closed, and the Ki contained, but through meditation and willpower, they may be opened, allowing those mystics who use Ki to gain new effects and abilities with their Ki.

Ki in this state is known as Dragonfire, and is more wild and potent than typical Ki.

Opening Chakras

To open up a Chakra, you must have successfully taken the Dragonfire Ascetic Feat a number of times equal to the level of the Chakra you wish you open, a Wisdom score equal to 10 + the level of that Chakra, an amount of HD greater than or equal to twice the level of that Chakra, and you must have opened all previous Chakras in order (i.e. you must have opened the Root and Sacral Chakras to open the Navel Chakra). Opening a Chakra requires a Chakra-Opening Ritual

Chakra-Opening Ritual

Conducting a Chakra-opening ritual requires a number of consecutive days of constant fasting and Meditation equal to the level of the Chakra (i.e., you must fast and meditate for 5 days to open the Throat Chakra). It is highly suggested that this Ritual be performed during Donwtime.

You must receive at least 8 hours of rest at night before beginning Meditation each day. At the beginning of each day, you must take a meditative position anywhere you so choose. For the next 16 hours, you must meditate constantly, and may do nothing during this time (not even eat or drink). At the end of the 16 hours, you may eat and drink, and if you have not completed the Ritual entirely, you must immediately begin resting again.

While meditating, if you are disturbed in any way, you must make a Concentration Check as though you were casting a Spell (your Concentration modifier is equal to 1/2 your HD + your Wisdom Modifier, and the Check uses the Level of the Chakra as the Level of the Spell when calculating).

If you fail any check this way, or if you do not receive 8 hours of Rest, your Meditation for the day is ruined, and you must begin the Ritual again the next day.

If you fail to successfully Meditate for two days in a row, the Ritual Fails entirely, you fail to gain the Dragonfire Ascetic Feat, and instead gain Extra Ki.

You must thereafter spend time Retraining to gain access to the Dragonfire Ascetic Feat once again and begin a new Ritual.

If you successfully complete the Ritual, you gain the Dragonfire Ascetic Feat and unlock the next level of Chakra.

Chakras By Level

1st - Root Chakra: While you have at least 1 Ki in your Ki Pool, you have DR/- equal to your 1/2 your HD. This stacks with all other sources that provide DR (including DR/-)

2nd - Sacral Chakra: While you have at least 2 Ki in your Ki Pool, you may spend 1 Ki as Free Action to gain a Fly Speed equal to your Base Speed with Average Maneuverability for a number of Rounds equal to your HD.

3rd - Navel Chakra: While you have at least 3 Ki in your Ki Pool, you gain a Breath Weapon special attack. As a Standard Action, you may spend 2 Ki Point to create a 30ft. Cone of Fire that deals 2d8 Fire damage +1d8 for every 3 HD you have beyond 6 (Reflex Save for half). The Save DC for this Breath Weapon is equal to 10 + 1/2 your HD + your Wisdom Modifier.

4th - Heart Chakra: While you have at least 4 Ki in your Ki Pool, you gain the Lay on Hands Paladin Class Feature, treating your total HD as your Paladin level for the purposes of this ability (this does not stack with the Paladin Class Feature). You must spend 3 Ki to activate this ability.

5th - Throat Chakra: While you have at last 5 Ki in your Ki Pool, you gain the ability to babble a mantra incessantly. Beginning and maintaining a babble is a Free Action, and requires 4 Ki to activate and 1 Ki every round to maintain. While babbling, you may choose any enemy within 30ft. of you who can hear you. If that enemy fails a Will Save (DC 10 + 1/2 your Hit Dice + your Charisma modifier), they become Staggered for a number of rounds equal to the amount of Ki in your Ki Pool when they became affected.

6th - Brow Chakra: While you have at least 6 Ki in your Ki Pool, you may spend 5 Ki as a Swift Action to cast True Seeing as a Spell-Like Ability.

7th - Crown Chakra: While you have at least 7 Ki in your Ki Pool, whenever you roll a d20, you may spend 6 Ki to roll 2 d20s instead and take whichever result you choose.

In addition, while you have at least 10 Ki in your Ki Pool, you may spend 30 minutes of continuous meditation and at least 10 Ki Points to cast Astral Projection as a Spell-Like Ability, but targeting only yourself. The Duration of this Spell-Like Ability is 30 minutes, plus 10 minutes for every Ki you spent when activating this ability.

Finally, reduce the cost to activate and maintain each other Chakra's abilities by 1.

NEW FEAT

DRAGONFIRE ASCETIC
Prerequisites: Ki Pool, Psychic Sensitivity, 2 or more Hit Dice
Special Prerequisite: As soon as you gain this Feat, you must conduct a Chakra Opening Ritual. If you fail this Ritual or choose not to take it, you lose this Feat and instead gain the Extra Ki Feat.
Benefit: Your Ki Pool increases by 1, and you gain access to another Chakra level.
Special: This Feat counts as Extra Ki for the purposes of effects and prerequisites. You may gain this Feat Multiple Times
Special: Whenever you Retrain to gain this Feat, you may attempt a Chakra Opening Ritual.

Reading through Occult Adventures, I took a look at the Cleric spell list, and found this fun little bitty:

Contagious Zeal
Cleric lv2
Enchantment (Compulsion) [Mind-Affecting, Emotion]
Duration: 1rd/lv

Target creature gains a +2 Morale Bonus to Attack and Damage Rolls, +1d6 Temporary Hit Points, a +4 Morale Bonus vs Fear effects, and a +4 Morale Bonus to the DC of Intimidate Checks made against her (e.g. the DC to intimidate her raises from DC15 to DC19.

Every round, the Target may choose one creature within line of sight who is no greater than 25ft+(5ft/2CL) away from her, and grant these same bonuses to that creature (but not the ability to spread the bonuses). All creatures so affected lose all bonuses and temp hit points when the original target's spell duration ends.

---

That's... pretty stinkin' awesome if you ask me.

Fervor-cast that thing and it's like casting Bulls-Strength-PLUS on yourself... and then afterwards you spread it (assumingly as a Free Action) to other members of your party or to your Battle Buddy that you summon starting at lv10.

The better thing is it isn't even Bull's Strength, so it can be applied to Dex-based builds as well!

And then there's the matter of the Temp HP, which is... well, okay, it's not THAT impressive, but any Temp HP is always welcome, right?

And since it's a Morale Bonus to Attack and Damage, it even STACKS with Bull's Strength or any of the similar lv2 Buff spells.

I know it's a Cleric spell, but it seems like the Warpriest gets a LOT more mileage out of this spell (due to Fervor-casting) than the Cleric does.

Reading through the Classes and their corresponding Archetypes, the Relic Channeler really stuck out to me.

From a logistical standpoint, from an adventuring standpoint, and from even an RP standpoint, it seems like it just works much better than the base Medium.

There's no need to find appropriate locations to channel Spirits; since you always have the same 1-6 Spirits on you, you can more-easily focus your character on only using 2-3 Spirits, or even just one Spirit almost singularly.

You don't need to remember which Taboo you decided to use each day, instead just associating each Spirit with a specific Taboo; at the same time, you don't need to reassign Spells or Skills, either (this might seems more limiting, but honestly it saves a TON of time and bookkeeping, since you can just have a quick reference go-to for each Spirit).

You can actually make the Spirits into long-running pseudo-NPCs, as well, since you'll always have the same Spirits at hand.

You gain Alertness whenever you're suffering an Influence penalty from a Spirit; you gain more Spells, more Proficiencies, more Feats, and more Skills from your Spirits.

And with Location Channel being replaced with Object Reading, you don't miss out on much as far as being able to gather information.

Yes, you miss out on Haunt Channeler, but that may prove next-to-useless if your DM doesn't include Haunts in their game.

---

In summation, what you trade out is fairly minimal, and what you gain in return is a much-more usable class.

It may seem like a major limit to only have the same 2 Arcane and Divine spells each level every time your channel, or the same 3 Skills, but honestly you'd probably find yourself gravitating towards those Spells and Skills anyway, excepting for very, very rare circumstances.

And since you don't have to go running around all of kingdom-come trying to find a proper Location to Channel a Spirit, nor have either you or the DM come up with a Spirit's soul & personality on-the-fly for that Location you're in at that exact moment, an RP-based character will have a much greater chance to develop a whole bunch of characters, motivations, etc.

I'm not sure about others, but while the basic Medium is pretty decent, the Relic Channeler just seems to blow the baseline Medium right out of the water in practice.

So... The Blood Kineticist Archetype...

This REALLY screams "evilly evilly eeeevil" but, c'mon... who DOESN'T wanna play Hama or pissed-as-hell Katara?

Anyone else kinda giddy that not only do we get Benders mostly-properly, (Elemental Ascetic), but also freakin' BLOODBENDERS? Oh, this is gonna be interesting going here on forward.

One of the most-glaring issues with the class currently is the dependence on Talents, both in the Social and Vigilante Persona.

The Social Persona at least gains some extra abilities as it levels (though far too few too far apart), but the Specializations are being treated almost entirely like Oracle Mysteries, where you get 1 minor ability and nothing but options later.

This worked fine with the Oracle, because the Oracle ALSO got Cruses AND 9th-level spell progressions.

But the Caster Specializations are being starved of half their talents JUST to be able to do what every other 6th-level caster does. Having a built-in tax for half talents is stymieing any practical usefulness these specializations might have otherwise had.

And, as a result, the Martials are also getting the short end of the stick, relying almost entirely on 10 Talents and no extra abilities (the Stalker gaining Hidden Strike is really the sole useful Specialization ability).

The total result is that while the Vigilante is still better off than it had been in Round 1, it's still not quite far enough to make the class into a useful, cool class.

---

The easy way of solving this issue of lacking power compared to other classes is actually fairly simple: more actual abilities, and natural spell progression where applicable.

Compare the Vigilante to solid classes like the Paladin, Ranger, Unchained Rogue, Bard, Inquisitor, etc., and it becomes pretty obvious that those classes all gain a wide variety of abilities every level; conversely, 9th-level casters generally get few abilities, but gain a large number of spells to supplement a lack of abilities (in the case of the Arcanist, it gains BOTH lots of abilities AND full spellcasting, which makes it extremely good).

---

So, simply put, the class should look like this:

BASE VIGILANTE (Social Persona)
lv1 Dual Identity, Seemless Guise, Social Talent, Specialization
lv2 Many Guises
lv3 Social Talent
lv4 Vengeance Strike 1/day (Full-Round Action)
lv5 Social Talent, Quick Change (Standard Action)
lv6 Everyman
lv7 Social Talent
lv8 Vengeance Strike 2/day (Move Action)
lv9 Social Talent
lv10 Any Guise, Quick Change (Standard Action)
lv11 Social Talent
lv12 Vengeance Strike 3/day (Swift Action)
lv13 Social Talent
lv14 "Guise" Ability
lv15 Social Talent, Quick Change (Move Action)
lv16 Vengeance Strike 4/day (Free Action)
lv17 Social Talent
lv18 "Guise" Ability
lv19 Social Talent
lv20 Capstone Ability, Quick Change (Swift Action), Vengeance Strike 5/day (Immediate Action)

MARTIAL SPECIALIZATIONS (Avenger & Stalker)
lv1 Assault Training, [Monk Unarmed damage progression + Improved Unarmed Strike] OR [Toughness + DR/- (scaling)] (Avenger); Hidden Strike (scales), Shadow Jaunt
lv2 Vigilante Talent
lv3 Vigilante Ability
lv4 Vigilante Talent
lv5 Vigilante Ability
lv6 Vigilante Talent
lv7 Vigilante Ability
lv8 Vigilante Talent
lv9 Vigilante Ability
lv10 Vigilante Talent
lv11 Vigilante Ability
lv12 Vigilante Talent
lv13 Vigilante Ability
lv14 Vigilante Talent
lv15 Vigilante Ability
lv16 Vigilante Talent
lv17 Vigilante Ability
lv18 Vigilante Talent
lv19 Vigilante Ability
lv20 Ultimate Vigialnte Talent (like Grand Discoveries)

CASTER SPECIALIZATIONS (Warlock & Zealot)
lv1 Spells (both, natural 6th-level progression), Mystic Bolt (Warlock, scales); Divine Powers (Zealot)
lv2 Vigilante Talent
lv3
lv4 Vigilante Talent
lv5
lv6 Vigilante Talent
lv7
lv8 Vigilante Talent
lv9
lv10 Vigilante Talent
lv11
lv12 Vigilante Talent
lv13
lv14 Vigilante Talent
lv15
lv16 Vigilante Talent
lv17
lv18 Vigilante Talent
lv19
lv20 Ultimate Vigialnte Talent (like Grand Discoveries)

---

I also assumed that the "Appearance" abilities are relegated to Talents, and the "Guise" talents are made into abilities, and that Vengeance Strike is a much greater Scaling ability.

Anyway, comparing these setups with existing classes like the Inquisitor & Bard (for the caster specializations), the Ranger (for the Avenger), and the Unchained Rogue (for the Stalker), you see that all these classes have lots of different abilities.

The Ranger and Rogue have lots of Class abilities at basically every level; the Bard and Inquisitor have a few less, but have natural 6th-level spellcasting progression to supplement slightly fewer abilities compared to other solid classes.

If the Social Persona gains progressive abilities to both disguise and change Personas, as well as progressive abilities to use Vengeance Strike as a basic ability, the Social Persona ends up being a solid base design (about as strong as the Pre-Unchined Rogue, so roughly 75% of a full class)

If the Casters gain natural progressive spellcasting, they only require 1 scaling ability at lv1, and can survive purely on the 10 Specialization Talents they acquire. Adding this on top of the Social Persona brings the class solidly up to the same levels of power as a Bard or Inquisitor.

Giving the Martials 2 Abilities at lv1 PLUS further standard abilities at every other level brings the Stalker and Avenger up to the same level of power as the Ranger or Unchained Rogue (Hidden Strike).

---

Like I said, this is a quick and simple fix, really, but would allow for much more time to be devoted to analyzing the Talents themselves in depth, rather than spend all this time trying to get the Vigilante chassis as a whole working.

If something like this was instituted, it would open the door for adding in many more talents and expanding upon the roles of these four specializations, possibly even further advancing them away from being a "Not-Stakler, Not-Rogue, Not-Magus, and Not-Inquisitor".

Oh, also, if Divine Powers are how the Zealot is going to be going (which it totally should), then maybe renaming it to "Scion" would be far better.

As in, Princess Zelda in disguise.

Sheik is/was an unrepentant badass both as Sheik and as Zelda. And it fits the entire theme of the Vigilante almost to a tee.

Fighting games may not be the best example in the world to base a TRPG's designs off of, but I feel like this is what the class should be aiming for:

A quick-changing character with two "modes" that accomplish radically different goals and allows the player to switch between the two when needed.

Obviously in Smash Bros., Zelda & Sheik are both stat'ed out to be combat-focused types, with Zelda being focused on long-range attacks and higher defense while Sheik is all about melee combat and speed/agility. But the fact stands that the design is very solid, interesting, and allows for players to play as they choose.

There are some players who never leave the Zelda guise, there are others who use Sheik exclusively. And, obviously, you have players who switch between the two constantly.

2 thematically-different classes can exist in one whole class without breaking the game; they just have to have the right balance, both with each other and among other Classes.

There's been a lot of "armchair playtesting" apparently, and the devs don't seem to put as much salt into that as actual playtesting.

I've already gone on the record saying my group tried the Vigilante and didn't like it, but maybe I should elaborate more.

We ran a one-shot game using an update of Scourge of the Slavelords. The general setting seemed a good one for a Vigilante class.

The Party began at lv5; the player using the Vigilante chose to play a Silver-Tongued Human Stalker Vigilante and had the following stats:

Str 10 / Dex 20 / Con 14 / Int 12 / Wis 12 / Cha 16
HP39 / AC22 TAC15 FFAC17 (Armor +6, Dex +5, Natural +1)

Skills Use Magic Device +15, Acrobatics +13, Stealth +13, Bluff +13, Diplomacy +13, Slight of Hand +10, Sense Motive +11, Perception +9, Intimidate +8

Talents Rogue Talent - Minor Magic (Detect Magic), Rogue Talent - Major Magic (Vanish)

Feats Weapon Finesse, Two-Weapon Fighting, Weapon Focus (Sickle), Slashing Grace (presupposing the errata that lets it include 1-handed Slashing weapons)

Gear +2 Mithral Chain Shirt, Amulet of Natural Armor +1, 2 Masterwork Sickles, Wand of Vanish

We used the Unchained forms of Minor and Major Magic. We also included the idea that Rogue Talent counted his Vigilante Levels as Rogue Levels; we needed to do this because the ability doesn't say that, meaning RAW it really doesn't work.

---

The player using the Vigilante decided to go the Two-Weapon Fighting and Major Magic route to make use of Startling Appearance, although he admitted that was, in many ways, taking the lesser of two evils - taking Up Close and Personal would have been a less Feat-Intensive choice in some ways, but in others was far more situational, and still would have required him to have a high Dex.

---

The adventure begins basically with a Downtime episode, with the Party and the town of Safeton enjoying the Feats of Edoira.

The Vigilante took this time to enter his Social Persona and go about town schmoozing and raising his Renown by a whopping 1 point of Renown; I allowed this on top of the other general Downtime Activities, and in the end he found that using Downtime to gain Influence was FAR more useful than spending time to gain Renown.

---

After the Feat of Edoira, we got into the actual nitty-gritty of the adventure, with "Alas, Disaster! Alas!"

After this part of the Adventure took place, the Party attempted to try and Gather Information, using both the Renown and Influence the Vigilante had gathered, and eventually they encountered The Mad One; while the Vigilante couldn't Sense Motive against the spy, the Inquisitor did, and Combat began.

And here's where the real painful lesson came in: the Vigilante, who had been in his Social Persona in order to try and gather info, wanted to change guises, but knew he couldn't because:

A) the docks were populated enough that there were others around to see him [/i](the Party already knew his secret identity, although WHY he had a secret identity in the first place was a contrived headache - we said that his Vigilante persona had angered a corrupt Lord and thus had a hefty bounty on his head; not something we were happy about, being forced to come up with an RP reason for a Mechanic to exist, rather than the other way around like usual).[/i]

B) it would take 50 Combat Rounds for him to change.

So, with the enemy right in front of him, he decided to just try and wing it; he didn't die, but wasn't surprised that his character fared about as well as one would expect an Expert NPC with PC-level gear to do - that is, barely passable.

---

After that, I declared that news of the Lord suddenly passing and the Lord's Son pardoning the Vigilante reached the Party.

The Vigilante switched to his Vigilante Persona permanently and never left it.

The rest of the Adventure continued without any divergence from the original plot.

---

Afterwards, the Vigilante player said, with no uncertainty, that he really couldn't stand the class.

A veteran-among-veterans of the game SpyCraft, he had expected something more useful and spy-like with the Social Persona, and knew he was in for pain the moment he saw that not only did the Social Persona NOT allow him any access to his Vigilante Persona talents, it also had absolute NO abilities whatsoever that aren't already covered basically by the default features of Skills, the Downtime System, and the Fame/Infamy system.

He also was NOT a fan of the fact that the class shoehorns you into being Batman; he'd rather have been a common person who could blend in with the average slobs of the streets, going into Michael Westen mode when the combat began.

And as far as his overall usefulness was concerned, he admitted that, even during character creation, he wished he had decided to play an Unchained Rogue instead - the fact that he had to burn 2 Feats just to get Dex to Attack and Damage, while a Rogue of 2 levels lower got that for FREE was painful.

On top of this, he got none of the Rogue's utility with things like Trapfinding or Danger Sense, or even the possible perks of taking Archetypes that exchange those abilities out for other, more useful things.

He had no problem with taking Minor or Major Magic, but was pretty salty that he had no room for Extra Talent due to the heavy Feat Investment JUST to make Startling Appearance relevant (Flat Footed against all attacks in a round is absolutely useless and redundant with Vanish unless you have 2+ Attacks already - he admitted that MAYBE if he'd been a Tengu that would have been a different story because of the Bite and 2 Claw Attacks... but that's an entirely-different build altogether).

Once I told him that there would also BE no "Extra Talent" for the Vigilante, he said, and I quote:

"THAT'S F~+%ING B~++$#*@!"

---

To say the least, he was not impressed. To say the most, he thought the entire thing was hogwash.

This is a player who loves James Bond, loves the game SpyCraft, loves PLAYING spies, and was hoping to co-op the Vigilante to BE the Spy class he'd always wanted for the game but always had to jury-rig together, and never to his complete liking.

Obviously, he didn't get that, and was upset that he didn't even get a competent class in its place.

He survived the adventure, yes, but he said it felt like playing a 3.5 Rogue all over again, and he would much rather have played an Unchained Rogue from the get-go if he knew that's what he was in for.

So...

I think a lot of people are in general consensus that Dual Identity needs a pretty massive rewrite.

A few ideas have been put forth, so I'll just let them be there where they are, although the one that stuck out to me the MOST was that you choose a Real Alignment and a Fake Alignment, with your Fake Alignment doing absolutely squat EXCEPT for treating you as that Alignment for game effects while you're in the appropriate identity - so like having a LN Fake Alignment when your Real Alignment is LG means you wouldn't take the extra damage from an Unholy Weapon, for example.

I like that idea.

The other problems seems to be that the Specializations are simultaneously too limited and too specialized. They're also pretty weak, giving rise to no end of "why not just play a fighter/rogue/slayer/magus/inqusitor" questions.

Finally, there's the whole problem of you being FORCED to have a Secret Identity without that Identity actually doing anything immediately useful.

---

SO, the problems as they current stand are:

1) Social Personas do almost nothing for you, yet by being there are forcing the Specializations to be weaker than comparable classes.

2) Dual Identity is borderline non-functioning. Its parameters are too wide, create too many rules interaction snarls, and is so abysmally slow that it makes switching from Civvie to Super while a fight is going on impossible (at least before lv13, which is cripplingly high for something that SHOULD be a standard trick).

3) Dual Identity ALSO disallows the use of Talents in your Social Persona, adding yet another nail in the coffin of both the Dual Identities and the Social Persona class features, meaning two central class features are left as "entirely unusable" for almost any standard campaign.

4) Specializations too closely mimic other classes while also being glaringly-inferior versions of those classes.

With those points in mind, I have a few ideas of what COULD be done to reinvent the class (with the already-stated fact that the devs don't intend to break the class into 2 or more classes):

1) Build the Social Persona up significantly from where it is now into an aspect of the class that players will want to utilize as much as the Vigilante aspects.

The Social Persona is weak - embarrassingly so.

As it stands, the ONLY thing that a Social Persona actually does is provide you with a +4 to a Skill at 1st, 6th, 10th, and so-on levels.

The Social Persona allows him to gain Renown, yes, but only in increments of 1 Week; this basically means that you'll be using the Social Persona in a specific setting during Downtime. However, this ability is basically useless in campaigns involving traveling bands who aren't headquartered in a Settlement (meaning, many, MANY campaigns). This seems like it should be far-less a built-in mechanic of the class and instead an option that plays in with already-established Downtime rules.

An answer to this is to make the Social Persona actually important - to build up the "Secret Identity" as a useful tool of the class.

Looking at the Master Spy Prestige Class, this is a good spring-board: the Master Spy takes the Social Rogue idea and turns it up to 11; the Social Persona, in turn, should also be this, and should possibly have Talents unto itself.

Make the Social Persona much more varied - allow the player to choose how he wants his Social Persona to be, and choose abilities accordingly: is it a Socialite who schmoozes and gathers info by diplomacy and smooth talking with the rich and powerful (Bruce Wayne, Oliver Queen, Hunter Rose); is it an expert who works with the heads of important institutions like the City Guard, the Priesthood, the Mafia, or the heads of a University (Barry Allen, Matt Murdock); is it a commoner who so thoroughly blends in with the average populace that it's nearly impossible to pick the Vigilante out in a crowd (Peter Parker, Virgil Hawkins).

Have the Social Persona be able to hide surface thoughts and get better as it levels; bonuses to not only Sense Motive but also Will Save bonuses against things like Telepathy, Discern Lies, etc.

Like the Rogue gaining Rogue's Edges, perhaps the Social Persona should gain Skill Focus as a Bonus Feat at level 1, possibly with the caveat of being applied to only Bluff, Diplomacy, and Intimidate.

You WANT people to want to play the Social Persona, and a way to do THAT is to basically make it an awesome class unto itself. Basically, make it into THE mundane Face/Spy class, and you're good to go.

For Combat-centric players, you want to make the Vigilante Persona an awesome draw with the Social Persona as icing on the cake; for RP and skill-focused players, you want the Social Persona to be their dream-come-true, with the combat-heavy Vigilante Persona being a nice topping to a sweet, sweet class.

2) Give Dual Identities a reason to exist beyond just fluff

In addition to these abilities, the Social Persona should also be able to, like the Master Spy, hide its Alignment.

As another forum-goer stated, make the False Alignment only 1 step away from the True Alignment, and have it actually be an honestly-False Alignment. You only count your True Alignment for prerequisites for feats, classes, etc.

Perhaps make the Social Persona the Mask, and thus the Social Persona has the False Alignment by default; while it's in the Social Persona, all forms of Detection treat the False Alignment as the true one, and the Persona is treated by all effects as being of the False Alignment, BUT any ill effects won't occur (such as Protection From spells and things like Holy, Axiomatic, etc. weapons).

Finally, obviously, the Social Persona should gain an immunity to Scrying effects that are targeting one Persona while the other Persona is active.

3) Make the change from one Identity to another much faster, and increase in speed over time.

Five Minutes to change is just awful. "Baby Geniuses 2" levels of awful.

5 Minutes means that if the Vigilante is caught in a Fight as its Social Persona, there is no way for it to change during that fight - that character is entirely dead-weight to the party.

Star out at something like 1 minute at first level, and decrease the change as it levels. A Full Round Action at lv5, Standard Action at lv10, Move Action at lv15, and a Swift Action at lv20, perhaps.

Perhaps even allow certain Specializations to adopt the Vigilante Persona for a single round as a Free Action once per day (possibly growing to more uses per day as you level).

4) Consolidate Avenger & Stalker into a single Martial Specialization

Right now, the Vigilante has 2 Martial and 2 Magical Specializations.

This has led to no ends of confusion that Dual Identities creates - while it's understandable that a Magical specialization might not be able to use magic as a Social Persona, there is no logical reason why the Martial specializations MUST NOT be able to use their talents in their Social Persona.

On top of this, the Avenger has been sited by several people as being inferior to the Fighter - that's not very good at all if the FIGHTER is considered a better option.

Instead, I'd highly suggest combining the Avenger and Stalker together.

Honestly, it works thematically - the ability to Sneak Attack while concealed, and then perform a muted SA while flanking or in the heat of Combat would work fine with a full BAB.

The special qualities of this Specialization would be that, not only do you treat the Vigilante's Class Levels as BAB while in the Specialization mode, you may ALSO use its Talents and class abilities in your Social Persona at your Class Level -4 (so, at Fourth Level, in your Social Persona, you could use talents and abilities of your Specialization as though you were lv1 in that Persona).

Give it not only access to some Rogue Talents, but also some things like Ranger Combat Styles, allowing it to take the Two-Weapon Fighting Tree as Talents at certain levels.

Also allow Talents that not only grant Improved Unarmed Strike, but also increases to damage of that Unarmed Strike at certain levels (probably putting it at a Monk's progression -4).

These would allow players to make an Unarmed Sneak Attacking Superhero pretty much just like Batman, Daredevil, etc.

There are even areas where it could be granted muted abilities of other Martial classes, like a reduced Rage, a weaker Challenge-like ability, a muted Smite, access to Firearms through a talent or two, etc.

A major way to make the Avenger/Stalker work as a Martial is to make it a potential jack-of-all-trades Martial that lets the player pick and choose reduced-power versions of other class's tricks, making it a sort of "generic martial" build.

Add a third Caster Specialization, and switch things around for the Warlock and Zealot

The Avenger/Stalker already have Str, Dex, and Con covered for stats.

Make the other three stats worthwhile, as well.

Make both the Zealot AND Warlock into Spontaneous Casters, and have a single table each for both Spells Known and Spells per Day. Also make a THIRD Spontaneous Caster class...

Change the Warlock to Charisma-based.

Change the Zealot to Wisdom-based.

Finally, add an Intelligence-based SPONTANEOUS ALCHEMIST Specialization to the mix, using the Alchemist Formulae List as its own; let's call it a... Chemist for right now.

Rather than concocting Bombs on-the-fly, and possibly not even using Mutagens at all, the Chemist instead throws together Extracts that it knows in the midst of fighting; of course, the trade-off is that it doesn't have a Formula, and only knows a limited number of Extracts as a result.

If nothing else, the very fact that the Vigilante would actually allow players to play a Spontaneous Alchemist would be an ENORMOUS draw for the class.

---

Anyway, these are my thoughts on the subject; I think something like this would greatly improve the reception of the class, and make the whole thing more enjoyable in any sort of game, not just in intrigue games.

So, looking at the Vigilante, seeing it tried out...

I can't really even call this class "half-done"

It's not even half-done.

It's more like one-QUARTER-done.

And the weirdest thing about it all isn't that the exact mechanics are bad, or poorly designed...

It's that the Vigilante doesn't know what the f@$* it is, and no-one else does. There's no special something to it to separate it from the other 30-odd classes out there. It's just... there. Doing it's thing, and no-one knows how or why it is, and it just ends up being a giant garbled mess of logical zig-zags.

---

Let me explain:

You really have 3 types of Superheroes out there -

1) The always-on-Superpowers heroes. These are your Supermen, your Wonder Women, your X-Men, Spider-Men... these are the heroes who never, ever, EVER get to really "turn off" their powers. They may have alter-egos or disguises, sure; J'onn J'onzz has "John Johns", Clark Kent only puts on the Superman suit when he needs to, etc.; they may also have absolutely no secret identity at all - just look at John Constantine, Doctor Strange, the Fantastic Four...

2) Badass-Normal Capes. This is Batman, Black Panther, Daredevil, Green Arrow, Nightwing, The Phanton, Rorschach. These are guys who are mundane, yes, but are still capable of going toe-to-toe with literal Gods.

3) Part-Time Ass-Kickers. THESE guys have power, but on a limited basis. THEY actually DO have to change in order to become Superheroes. These are your Power Rangers, your Sailor Scouts or PreCures; these are your Kamen Riders. They are also Green Lantern, Iron Man & Warmachine, Shazam!, and He-Man.

---

Now, I bring these up to show how the Vigilante doesn't know s&%! about what it wants to be thusly:

Type 1 Superheroes are pretty-much already covered. They're covered by supernatural classes like Paladins, Sorcerers, etc.; they're also covered by Races to a large degree, and Classes are secondary to only explain their martial prowess and non-superpower-related skills (Superman and Icon are Brawlers with absurdly broken Races).

Vigilante isn't needed at all here, because even though they have secret identities their powers never cease. Clark doesn't HAVE to put on the blue suit to be Superman - he can never NOT be a Kryptonian, and thus can fly from Metropolis, Delaware to Tokyo, Japan THE LONG WAY whenever he damn well feels like it.

Type 2 Superheroes get a lot of love from the Vigilante class... until you actually READ what the Vigilante class does, and then you barf so hard you wish you'd never read it and proceed to go on making a Character with one of several existing Archetypes that just make your Disguise check absolutely heinous.

The Vigilante says that you can't have your abilities unless you're in your Super mode, and yet wants to convince you that you can be completely mundane and still be a Super.

Now, I don't mind the idea of a Mundane being a Super, obviously - Zorro, Phantom, Batman, etc. are all cool characters. But they never AREN'T cool characters; they ALWAYS are capable of snapping a hundred mook necks without breaking a sweat - the Suit just enables them to have a secret identity.

And yet the Vigilane class says that, no - the Vigilante's Street persona doesn't get the abilities of its Super persona; despite being the same person, despite being 100% muggle, despite their costume having absolutely no special qualities whatsoever and may as well be the clothes our Hero pulled off a drunken Bum last tuesday, Oliver Queen CANNOT shoot arrows as well as Green Arrow because of... reasons.

So, that just leaves us with

Type 3 Superheroes. HERE is where the vigilante class makes sense, mechanically, but is missing a MAJOR part of itself.

Type 3s make SENSE to have both a Muggle and a Super form. They NEED some measure of outside support to be a Superhero.

Power Rangers may be Teenagers with Attitude and know martial arts, but without the Ranger Suits, they're still wonderfully squishy and only have human-level strength.

I don't care how cool any of the Green Lanterns are, even John Stewart - they are all humans, plain and simple. Except when they're aliens, but that's just peripheral. Generally, unless you're a god-moding DAXAMITE wearing a Lantern Ring, you are one of the trillions and trillions of star-fairing-or-not races with vaguely-human level abilities and are VERY susceptible to Darkseid squeezing your head under his armpit.

And Billy Batson... Billy, Billy, Billy. You think THAT little twelve-year-old could lift an aircraft carrier without shouting the word, SHAZAM! and causing Tesla to pop a boner in the afterlife? HELL NO. Captain Marvel is the power; Billy just operates the controls, as it were.

---

Type 3 heroes and villains are where the Vigilante shines; that's where the vigilante makes the most/only sense:

The Vigilante CAN'T let you use your Super abilities as a Civvie because your abilities are legitimately tied to your Alt-Ego.

And that's FINE; that makes SENSE, that works out fantastically with the class and would actually set it apart mechanically from the other classes.

Except that there's nothing in the class to explain this mechanically.

There's no Bonded Object or Object of Power; there's no Source for the alternate personality and a legitimate mechanical reason for their being two distinct characters in one body as it were.

There's no Scarab Beetle, no Ring of Power, no Powered-Armor, not even a Magical Command Word - NOTHING.

And BECAUSE there's nothing, you get the gigantic headaches of "why can't Bruce Wayne take down 5 Ninjas, but Batman can?", etc.

You get a giant piece of fluff and roleplaying folded sideways and shoved into the class, TRYING to make it fit, when it doesn't work.

As it stands, there's NO reason to not just make an NPC character, make a - I dunno... BRAWLER - character, and say they're the same people; one is just the "Secret Identity" while the other is the Hero.

---

Look, I WANT their to be a Vigilante class; I do.

But whomever came up with this class is either not a very big superhero fan (which means they're the absolutely WORST person to write a Superhero CLASS for f&+&'s sake), or they got a little overzealous and tried to shove WAY too many different ideas into a class.

It's not working, and it's not going to work.

At worst, this class needs to either drop the purely-mundane shtick and go with a "Super Item Grants Abilities" setup, OR it needs to allow the Civvie to use some abilities of the Super (although that just raises a lot of headaches) It doesn't need to have spells, but SOMETHING needs to say why Jim-Bob the Janitor and Captain Andoran can't have the same abilities 24/7.

At worst, this class NEEDS to be broken up into 2 different classes: one which is Mundane, and one which is Supernatural in some way or another.

Frankly, I'd go with the first choice, and just drop the "I'm Batman" thing entirely.

Unless you can work out MECHANICALLY how a Secret Identity makes logical sense AS A MECHANIC to let Batman be Batman in a better way than doing what the Internet has been doing for decades - I.E. building Batman exactly without ever needing a "Secret Identity" mechanic - then it's better to just completely drop that idea.

I don't think many people will cry; we've already spent decades building Batman, Daredevil... hell, even Iron Fist... without the Vigilante Class.

However, what HASN'T been done as an actual Class is the Power Rangers, Green Lanterns, et all.

EVERYONE has come up with their own ways in which a character can go from Mundane to Super in a heartbeat, and the Vigilante Class would actually be a legitimate, elegant answer to that.

BUT, the Vigilante can't just stay as it is - it needs to decide what it wants to be when it grows up, and it needs something to make it ACTUALLY mechanically different and interesting compared to the other classes, to set it apart and give it that "yeah, this really IS the only or best way to do this design" feeling that every other class has.

My vote for that "something" is an Item of Power.

I think the Vigilante needs a serious lookover in regards to its Costume Change thing.

5 Minutes until lv13 is just... excessive.

Like, cripplingly bad.

My group tried this quickly, and it immediately became apparent that there was nearly no reason for the Vigilante to ever be in their street Persona, simply because the amount of time it takes to switch meant that it was more dangerous to NOT be Batman than to try and switch between Batman and Bruce Wayne.

If you're knee deep in an adventure, and you need 5 WHOLE MINUTES to change, you may be completely stuck in your Street persona for the entire adventure if you're lv1-12.

This thing is intended to be put into play for Pathfinder Society, right?

So what exactly is the point of making the Quick-Change ability well out of the PFS range for adventuring?

At worst, it should be a soft-capstone ability at lv11.

It also needs to be significantly faster from the get-go, and would work better as a progression of speeds as you level.

Think of this thing as Kamen Rider/Sailor Moon/Batman/Shazam! etc.

lv1: it's a 1-minute Action.

lv5: Full-Round Action

lv8: Standard Action

lv11: Move Action

Lv14: Swift Action

lv17: Free Action

lv20: Immediate Action

---

Making it faster may also open up crazy strategies of things like characters switching into and out-of personas between each Hit, which wouldn't really be possible until lv14+ here, so you wouldn't need to worry about this nonsense in PFS.

A quick & easy way to eliminate that silliness would be to say that you can only switch Personas once per Round.

It's no question that Variant Multiclassing has created some really wonky & neat reactions with things; but there are now simpler, faster, and potentially more effective routes to entering Prestige Classes than ever before because of VMCs.

A few I've noticed:

Wild Stalker Ranger 5 + Oracle VMC to Rage Prophet at lv6

Exemplar Brawler 5 + Cavalier VMC to Battle Herald at lv6

Sandman Bard 7 + Rogue VMC to Arcane Trickster at lv8 (a level later than Sandman 5 + Rogue 1, or Rogue 3 + Wizard/Witch 3, but it has a greater BAB as a result and doesn't lose any tempo for spell progression, either)

Wizard/Witch 5 + Oracle VMC to Eldritch Knight lv6 (you take Battle Mystery and choose Skill at Arms at lv3, then just wait 2 levels until you can cast 3rd level spells)

On a related note, I've noticed that it's now possible to do:

Bloodrager 6 to Arcane Archer at lv7

It's not a VMC example, but it's pretty awesome that Arcane Archer is able to be entered as early as lv7 (and as a few Barbarian guides have noted, Barbarians/Bloodragers actually make excellent archers anyway, so... win-win)

Scout Swashbuckler Underground Chemist Rogue, Alchemist VMC

Race Human Two-Weapon Fighting
CL1 Rog/Alc1 Point-Blank Shot, Weapon Finesse; Sneak Attack 1d6
CL2 Rog/Alc2 Chemical Weapons, Combat Training – Quick Draw
CL3 Rog/Alc3 Alchemy, Finesse Training (Dagger); Sneak Attack 2d6
CL4 Rog/Alc4 Debilitating Injury, Scout’s Charge, Precise Splash Weapons
CL5 Rog/Alc5 Precise Shot Rogue’s Edge – Acrobatics, Sneak Attack 3d6
CL6 Rog/Alc6 Weapon Training – Weapon Focus (Dagger)
CL7 Rog/Alc7 Bombs 4d6, Sneak Attack 4d6
CL8 Rog/Alc8 Combat Training – Rapid Shot, Skirmisher
CL9 Rog/Alc9 Improved Two-Weapon Fighting, Bomb 5d6, Sneak Attack 5d6
CL10 Rog/Alc10 Hunter’s Surprise, Rogue’s Edge – Stealth
CL11 Rog/Alc11 Mutagen; Bomb 6d6, Sneak Attack 6d6

---

Variant Multiclass Alchemist treats your entire Class Levels as Alchemist for determining your Bombs, under the assumption that you won't get Int to the Bombs; however, Underground Chemist gives you Int to Splash Weapons, along with adding Sneak Attack damage to them, meaning every Bomb is effectively doubled, adding Int to the attack as well.

This is the setup my group will be playing with in an upcoming campaign. It's going to be potentially very... "Meat Grinder"-y.

First, we're using our typical setup for Critical Hits

Second, and more importantly, we're using the Wounds and Vigor rules

In tandem with the Wounds and Vigor rules, we're also using the Wound Threshold rules, as presented in Pathfinder Unchained (mostly).

Now, the Wounds and Vigor rules don't quite go into extreme detail beyond how they function in a bubble and with a few other rules (like healing), and don't EXACTLY cover how they interact with other systems or even common rules like Bleeding damage, so I had to figure out how those would work.

The result was an utter bloodbath, which I'm... kinda totally okay with.

SO.

WOUNDS & VIGOR WITH...

Called Shots & Massive Damage

The Massive Damage and Debilitating Blow values for Wound & Vigor are equal to the creatures’ Constitution score (no minimum). This completely replaces the usual "half it's HP, minimum 50 damage)" rule.

When a creature takes Wound damage equal to its Constitution Score in a single, non-Called Shot hit, it must succeed on a DC15 Fortitude save or immediately die.

If a creature takes Wound Damage equal to its Constitution Score as part of a single Called Shot Attack, that creature receives the Debilitating Called Shot effect of that Attack.

Critical Called Shots don't need to be changed - they activate when a Critical Hit is scored in a Called Shot, and this functions the exact same way with this system.

Saving Throws for Called Shots are already described in detail and they work perfectly fine with this system, as well (since they're based not on the Damage dealt, but on the AC hit).

Wound Thresholds
Wound Thresholds are calculated with Wounds alone, though using the Gritty Mode.

To wit:

A character with 18 Constitution has 36 Wounds. While they have 36-28 Wounds, they are Healthy and take no penalties; 27-19 Wounds, they are Grazed and suffer a -2 penalty; 18-10 Wounds, they are Wounded, they gain the Staggered condition, and they suffer a -4 Penalty; 9-1 Wounds, they are Critical, and suffer a -6 Penalty; at 0 Wounds, they are Dead.

If a Wounded/Critical creature takes a Standard or Move Action on its turn and fails its DC10 Constitution Check, it falls Unconscious and gains the Dying Condition.

Bleed Damage
Bleed damage, like Critical Hits, is automatically applied to Wounds.

Constructs
Under the Wounds and Vigor system, Constructs simply have HP/Vigor; Constructs already have no Constitution score at all, so they simply stop moving when their Vigor reaches 0 (they turn into Objects at that point).

Undead
Undead have Wounds equal to twice their Charisma score, since they replace their Constitution with Charisma under the normal rules for calculating Hit Points.

---

What all this does together is create a very, very nasty game, where even non-magical, mid-level characters with non-masterwork weapons can cause the death of high-level full-casters with surprising ease.

Rather than be a minor annoyance under the normal Hit Point rules, Bleed Damage is actually extraordinarily deadly.

This makes the Wounding weapon enhancement, the Brow Gasher spell, the Bleeding Attack Rogue Talent, and the Bleeding Critical feat, among a plethora of other abilities, extremely useful.

Suddenly Rogues focusing in Bleed damage and Fighters using Critical Feats (especially when combined with the Stamina ability of Bleeding Critical) are some of the most-devastating combatants on the battlefield.

While it DOES make things like hitting Debilitating Called Shots more difficult when an enemy still has plenty of Vigor, it also makes them MUCH more likely after you've worn them down. (it also, again, makes things like Bleeding Attack or Bleeding Critical absolutely DISGUSTING in how easily it becomes to lop someone's arm off, for instance).

Oddly enough, this also, unfortunately, makes the Holy Vindicator Prestige Class very, VERY dangerous to its user, as you'll be taking a pretty substantial amount of Bleed Damage if you choose to use your Stigmata ability.

Then again, making one Prestige Class very deleterious so that you can get all this blood-&-guts goodness is something I and my playgroup are pretty okay with.

---

I decided I'd put this out there for anyone who was trying to figure out how things like Wound Thresholds would work with the W&V system, as well as things like Bleeding and Called Shots, as I've seen questions concerning their interactions, but I haven't seen a consensus on what, if anything, would work.

So, there you have it - Pathfinder: Frank Miller Edition (sans the misogyny, bad dialogue, and rampant racism).

A DM I had once had a recurring "villain": a Fiendish Vampiric Wereduck.

Little bugger had a fairly absurd number of Class Levels to its name, and every so often would just randomly appear and cause absolute havoc for the party.

What are other peoples' strangest encounters ever?

I like the look of the new Shops mechanic as part of the Profession skill in Unchained, but I also really like the rules for Downtime, especially Running a Business.

However, unlike Unchained Crafting, the Unchained Profession rules for setting up a shop don't really seem to want to play nicely with the Downtime Rules.

Is there any way to make the two coexist?

I just got my copy of Unchained today, and one of the things that caught my eye was Wound Thresholds.

I really like the Wounds & Vigor rules, and like the idea of the Wound Threshold rules from Unchained.

The question is, I kinda want to use them together, so how should I go about this?

I kinda see 3 options open to me right now:

1) Wound Thresholds only affect Wounds, after Vigor has been eaten up.

2) Wound Thresholds affect Vigor, and the penalties continue on through to Wounds

3) Use either Wound Thresholds OR Wounds & Vigor.

I understand the idea of the Unchained Barbarian sorta "streamlining" the whole Rage process.

It doesn't actually CHANGE anything about how the Barbarian's Rage functions (except in how temp hit points are calculated, which could have simply been a rules patch, honestly, saying "temp hit points gained by Con boosts are added like normal Temp Hit Points"), it just changes the routes as to how the Barbarian arrives at the same destination.

But, unlike the Rogue - who seems to be creating very few interaction snarls - there seems to be no ends of issues with how the Unchained Barbarian interacts with everything OUTSIDE of the Unchained Barbarian's entry.

In other words, the Unchained Barbarian functions pretty well in a bubble, but once you start trying to combine it with other options outside of itself, it creates major interactivity snarls.

Raging Vitality comes to mind, as does the Urban Barbarian.

Then I see questions involving Rage combined with Alchemist Bombs, whether the Unchained Rage should be applied to Bloodrager's Rage or the Raging Song of the Skald or whether it now stacks with either of those abilities, etc.

Then there's the whole philosophical question of, "why change the Barbarian's Rage, when the Alchemists' Mutagen is the same thing, yet didn't get addressed?"

What it all boils down to is: some people felt Rage was too complicated, and wanted a "fix", but if the "fix" causes so many rules interaction nightmares for both the Players and the DM that never existed before, what's the point?

First off, a little disclaimer:

I don't own Pathfinder Unchained yet, so I really have no idea what the Monk looks like, how it plays, etc. I'm pretty neutral to the whole deal, so I can't "dislike" it.

However, I do think that's it's a shame that the Unchained Monk doesn't work with any Monk Archetypes. Personally, one of the best things about the Unchained Rogue I've heard are that ALL Archetypes are still perfectly viable and usable.

Yes, the Unchained Monk is an Alternate Class effectively, so there's no guarantee that it was going to be able to use Archetypes properly anyway.

Still, I think there was a bit of a missed opportunity to do a straight upgrade to the Monk's basic architecture and not mess up its viability to use Archetypes.

So, I came up with a design here, based on ideas I mentioned in another thread.

====================================================================

Lv__BAB_Fort__Ref_Will__Speed__AC__Dmg__Flurry_____________________Special
1___+0__+2___+2__+2___+0_____+0___1d6___-1/-1_________________________Bonus Feat, Flurry of Blows, Stunning Fist, Unarmed Strike, Monk's Way
2___+1__+3___+3__+3___+0_____+0___1d6___+0/+0________________________Bonus Feat, Evasion, Way Ability, Mantra, Special Technique
3___+2__+3___+3__+3___+10____+0___1d6___+1/+1________________________Fast Movement, Maneuver Training, Still Mind
4___+3__+4___+4__+4___+10____+1___1d8___+2/+2________________________Ki Pool (Magic), Slow Fall 20ft., Ki Power
5___+3__+4___+4__+4___+10____+1___1d8___+3/+3________________________High Jump, Purity of Body, Special Technique, Flurry's Focus +1
6___+4__+5___+5__+5___+20____+1___1d8___+4/+4/-1_____________________Bonus Feat, Slow Fall 30ft
7___+5__+5___+5__+5___+20____+1___1d8___+5/+5/+0_____________________Ki Pool (Cold Iron/Silver), Wholeness of Body, Ki Power
8___+6__+6___+6__+6___+20____+2___1d10__+6/+6/+1/+1__________________Slow Fall (40ft,), Special Technique
9___+6__+6___+6__+6___+30____+2___1d10__+7/+7/+2/+2__________________Improv ed Evasion, Flurry's Focus +2, Way Ability
10__+7__+7___+7__+7___+30____+2___1d10__+8/+8/+3/+3__________________Bonus Feat, Ki Pool (Lawful), Slow Fall 50ft, Ki Power
11__+8__+7___+7__+7___+30____+2___1d10__+9/+9/+4/+4/-1________________Diamo nd Body, Special Technique, Powerful Mantra
12__+9__+8___+8__+8___+40____+3___2d6___+10/+10+/+5/+5/+0____________Abunda nt Step, Slow Fall 60ft
13__+9__+8___+8__+8___+40____+3___2d6___+11/+11/+6/+6/+1_____________Diamon d Soul, Ki Power, Flurry's Focus +3
14__+10_+9___+9__+9___+40____+3___2d6___+12/+12/+7/+7/+2_____________Bonus Feat, Slow Fall 70ft, Special Technique
15__+11_+9___+9__+9___+50____+3___2d6___+13/+13/+8/+8/+3/+3__________Quiver ing Palm
16__+12_+10__+10_+10__+50____+4___2d8___+14/+14/+9/+9/+4/+4/-1________Ki Pool (Adamantine), Slow Fall 80ft, Ki Power, Way Ability
17__+12_+10__+10_+10__+50____+4___2d8___+15/+15/+10/+10/+5/+5/+0_____Timele ss Body, Tongue of the Sun and Moon, Special Technique, Flurry's Focus +4
18__+13_+11__+11_+11__+60____+4___2d8___+16/+16/+11/+11/+6/+6/+1_____Bonus Feat, Slow Fall 90ft
19__+14_+11__+11_+11__+60____+4___2d8___+17/+17/+12/+12/+7/+7/+2_____Empty Body, Ki Power
20__+15_+12__+12_+12__+60____+5___2d10__+18/+18/+13/+13/+8/+8/+3_____Perfec t Body, Slow fall any distance, Transcendent Mantra, Ultimate Technique

Alignment: Any non-Chaotic
Hit Die: d8
Starting Wealth: 1d6 × 10 gp (average 35 gp.) In addition, each character begins play with an outfit worth 10 gp or less.

The monk's class skills are Acrobatics (Dex), Climb (Str), Craft (Int), Escape Artist (Dex), Intimidate (Cha),Knowledge (history) (Int), Knowledge (religion) (Int), Perception (Wis), Perform (Cha), Profession (Wis), Ride (Dex), Sense Motive (Wis), Stealth (Dex), and Swim (Str).

Skill Ranks per Level: 4 + Int modifier.

CLASS FEATURES

Weapon and Armor Proficiency: Monks are proficient with the club, crossbow (light or heavy), dagger, handaxe, javelin, kama, nunchaku, quarterstaff, sai, shortspear, short sword, shuriken, siangham, sling, and spear.

Monks are not proficient with any armor or shields.

When wearing armor, using a shield, or carrying a medium or heavy load, a monk loses his AC bonus, as well as his fast movement and flurry of blows abilities.

AC Bonus (Ex): When unarmored and unencumbered, the monk adds his Wisdom bonus (if any) to his AC and his CMD. In addition, a monk gains a +1 bonus to AC and CMDat 4th level. This bonus increases by 1 for every four monk levels thereafter, up to a maximum of +5 at 20th level.

These bonuses to AC apply even against touch attacks or when the monk is flat-footed. He loses these bonuses when he is immobilized or helpless, when he wears any armor, when he carries a shield, or when he carries a medium or heavy load.

Flurry of Blows (Ex): Starting at 1st level, a monk can make a flurry of blows as a full-attack action. When doing so, he may make on additional attack, taking a -2 penalty on all of his attack rolls, as if using the Two-Weapon Fighting feat. These attacks can be any combination of unarmed strikes and attacks with a monk special weapon (he does not need to use two weapons to use this ability). For the purpose of these attacks, the monk's base attack bonus from his monk class levels is equal to his monk level. For all other purposes, such as qualifying for a feat or a prestige class, the monk uses his normal base attack bonus.

At 8th level, the monk can make two additional attacks when he uses flurry of blows, as if using Improved Two-Weapon Fighting (even if the monk does not meet the prerequisites for the feat).

At 15th level, the monk can make three additional attacks using flurry of blows, as if using Greater Two-Weapon Fighting (even if the monk does not meet the prerequisites for the feat).

A monk applies his full Strength bonus to his damage rolls for all successful attacks made with flurry of blows, whether the attacks are made with an off-hand or with a weapon wielded in both hands. A monk may substitute disarm, sunder, and trip combat maneuvers for unarmed attacks as part of a flurry of blows. A monk cannot use any weapon other than an unarmed strike or a special monk weapon as part of a flurry of blows. A monk with natural weapons cannot use such weapons as part of a flurry of blows, nor can he make natural attacks in addition to his flurry of blows attacks.

Unarmed Strike: At 1st level, a monk gains Improved Unarmed Strike as a bonus feat. A monk's attacks may be with fist, elbows, knees, and feet. This means that a monk may make unarmed strikes with his hands full. There is no such thing as an off-hand attack for a monk striking unarmed. A monk may thus apply his full Strength bonus on damage rolls for all his unarmed strikes.
Usually a monk's unarmed strikes deal lethal damage, but he can choose to deal nonlethal damage instead with no penalty on his attack roll. He has the same choice to deal lethal or nonlethal damage while grappling.

A monk's unarmed strike is treated as both a manufactured weapon and a natural weapon for the purpose of spells and effects that enhance or improve either manufactured weapons or natural weapons.

A monk also deals more damage with his unarmed strikes than a normal person would, as shown above on Table: Monk. The unarmed damage values listed on Table: Monk is for Medium monks. A Small monk deals less damage than the amount given there with his unarmed attacks, while a Large monk deals more damage; see Small or Large Monk Unarmed Damage

Bonus Feat: At 1st level, 2nd level, and every 4 levels thereafter, a monk may select a bonus feat. These feats must be taken from the following list: Catch Off-Guard,Combat Reflexes, Deflect Arrows, Dodge, Improved Grapple, Scorpion Style, and Throw Anything. At 6th level, the following feats are added to the list: Gorgon's Fist,Improved Bull Rush, Improved Disarm, Improved Feint, Improved Trip, and Mobility. At 10th level, the following feats are added to the list: Improved Critical, Medusa's Wrath, Snatch Arrows, and Spring Attack. A monk need not have any of the prerequisites normally required for these feats to select them.

Stunning Fist (Ex): At 1st level, the monk gains Stunning Fist as a bonus feat, even if he does not meet the prerequisites. At 4th level, and every 4 levels thereafter, the monk gains the ability to apply a new condition to the target of his Stunning Fist. This condition replaces stunning the target for 1 round, and a successful saving throw still negates the effect. At 4th level, he can choose to make the target fatigued. At 8th level, he can make the target sickened for 1 minute. At 12th level, he can make the target staggered for 1d6+1 rounds. At 16th level, he can permanently blind or deafen the target. At 20th level, he can paralyze the target for 1d6+1 rounds. The monk must choose which condition will apply before the attack roll is made. These effects do not stack with themselves (a creature sickened by Stunning Fist cannot become nauseated if hit by Stunning Fist again), but additional hits do increase the duration.

Monk's Way (Ex): At 1st level, the Monk counts his Monk levels as his Base Attack Bonus for the purposes of meeting the requirements for Feats and Prestige Classes. In addition, the Monk chooses a Way that represents his training and martial philosophy. The Way grants the Monk a number of special abilities, Special Techniques, Ki Powers, and determines the nature of his Mantra.

Evasion (Ex): At 2nd level or higher, a monk can avoid damage from many area-effect attacks. If a monk makes a successful Reflex saving throw against an attack that normally deals half damage on a successful save, he instead takes no damage. Evasion can be used only if a monk is wearing light armor or no armor. A helpless monk does not gain the benefit of evasion.

Mantra: At 2nd level, a Monk learns to chant during battle, which focuses his mind and body purely on the martial tasks at hand. As a Swift Action, the Monk begins chanting his Mantra, granting him a +4 Confidence Bonus to one Ability Score, based on the Philosophy of his Way. Maintaining a Mantra is a Free Action that must be made at the beginning of each of the Monk's turns. A Monk may perform his Mantra for a number of rounds each day equal to 4 + his Monk Level.

Beginning and Maintaining a Mantra requires the Monk to either Attack or Move. A Monk who is Stunned, Grappled, Paralyzed cannot begin a Mantra, and any Mantra he is already chanting immediately ends. Similarly, a Mantra requires the Monk to chant during combat, so if the Monk becomes Silenced (but not Deafened), he cannot begin a Mantra, and any Mantra he is already chanting immediately ends.

Special Technique (Ex): At 2nd level, the Monk chooses a Special Technique granted by his Way and learns to use it during Combat. At 5th level and every 3rd level thereafter, the Monk chooses and learns another Special Technique.

Fast Movement (Ex): At 3rd level, a monk gains an enhancement bonus to his land speed, as shown on Table: Monk. A monk in armor or carrying a medium or heavy load loses this extra speed.

Maneuver Training (Ex): At 3rd level, a monk uses his monk level in place of his base attack bonus when calculating his Combat Maneuver Bonus. Base attack bonuses granted from other classes are unaffected and are added normally.

Still Mind (Ex): A monk of 3rd level or higher gains a +2 bonus on saving throws against enchantment spells and effects.

Ki Pool (Su): At 4th level, a monk gains a pool of ki points, supernatural energy he can use to accomplish amazing feats. The number of points in a monk's ki pool is equal to 1/2 his monk level + his Wisdom modifier. As long as he has at least 1 point in his ki pool, he can make a ki strike. At 4th level, ki strike allows his unarmed attacks to be treated as magic weapons for the purpose of overcoming damage reduction. At 7th level, his unarmed attacks are also treated as cold iron and silver for the purpose of overcoming damage reduction. At 10th level, his unarmed attacks are also treated as lawful weapons for the purpose of overcoming damage reduction. At 16th level, his unarmed attacks are treated as adamantine weapons for the purpose of overcoming damage reduction and bypassing hardness.

By spending 1 point from his ki pool, a monk can make one additional attack at his highest attack bonus when making a flurry of blows attack. In addition, he can spend 1 point to increase his speed by 20 feet for 1 round. Finally, a monk can spend 1 point from his ki pool to give himself a +4 dodge bonus to AC for 1 round. Each of these powers is activated as a swift action. A monk gains additional powers that consume points from his ki pool as he gains levels.

The ki pool is replenished each morning after 8 hours of rest or meditation; these hours do not need to be consecutive.

Slow Fall (Ex): At 4th level or higher, a monk within arm's reach of a wall can use it to slow his descent. When first gaining this ability, he takes damage as if the fall were 20 feet shorter than it actually is. The monk's ability to slow his fall (that is, to reduce the effective distance of the fall when next to a wall) improves with his monk level until at 20th level he can use a nearby wall to slow his descent and fall any distance without harm.

Ki Power (Su): At 4th level, the Monk chooses and learns one Ki Power granted by his Way. At 7th level and every 3 levels thereafter, the Monk learns an additional Ki Power granted by his Way.

High Jump (Ex): At 5th level, a monk adds his level to all Acrobatics checks made to jump, both for vertical jumps and horizontal jumps. In addition, he always counts as having a running start when making jump checks using Acrobatics. By spending 1 point from his ki pool as a swift action, a monk gains a +20 bonus on Acrobatics checks made to jump for 1 round.

Purity of Body (Ex): At 5th level, a monk gains immunity to all diseases, including supernatural and magical diseases.

Flurry's Focus (Ex): At 5th level, while Chanting his Mantra, a Monk gains a +1 Competence Bonus on each Attack made as part of his Flurry of Blows. This bonus increases by +1 for every 4 levels beyond 5th (to a maximum of +4 at 17th level).

Wholeness of Body (Su): At 7th level or higher, a monk can heal his own wounds as a standard action. He can heal a number of hit points of damage equal to his monk level by using 2 points from his ki pool.

Improved Evasion (Ex): At 9th level, a monk's evasion ability improves. He still takes no damage on a successful Reflex saving throw against attacks, but henceforth he takes only half damage on a failed save. A helpless monk does not gain the benefit of improved evasion.

Diamond Body (Su): At 11th level, a monk gains immunity to poisons of all kinds.

Powerful Mantra (Ex): At 11th level, a Monk learns to integrate his Ki into his Mantra, granting an even greater boost of power. While the Monk has at least 1 Ki in his Ki Pool, the Competence Bonus granted by his Mantra increases to +6, and he may begin his Mantra as a Free Action.

Abundant Step (Su): At 12th level or higher, a monk can slip magically between spaces, as if using the spell dimension door. Using this ability is a move action that consumes 2 points from his ki pool. His caster level for this effect is equal to his monk level. He cannot take other creatures with him when he uses this ability.

Diamond Soul (Ex): At 13th level, a monk gains spell resistance equal to his current monk level + 10. In order to affect the monk with a spell, a spellcaster must get a result on a caster level check (1d20 + caster level) that equals or exceeds the monk's spell resistance.

Quivering Palm (Su): Starting at 15th level, a monk can set up vibrations within the body of another creature that can thereafter be fatal if the monk so desires. He can use this quivering palm attack once per day, and he must announce his intent before making his attack roll. Creatures immune to critical hits cannot be affected. Otherwise, if the monk strikes successfully and the target takes damage from the blow, the quivering palm attack succeeds. Thereafter, the monk can try to slay the victim at any later time, as long as the attempt is made within a number of days equal to his monk level. To make such an attempt, the monk merely wills the target to die (a free action), and unless the target makes a Fortitude saving throw (DC 10 + 1/2 the monk's level + the monk's Wis modifier), it dies. If the saving throw is successful, the target is no longer in danger from that particular quivering palm attack, but it may still be affected by another one at a later time. A monk can have no more than 1 quivering palm in effect at one time. If a monk uses quivering palm while another is still in effect, the previous effect is negated.

Timeless Body (Ex): At 17th level, a monk no longer takes penalties to his ability scores for aging and cannot be magically aged. Any such penalties that he has already taken, however, remain in place. Age bonuses still accrue, and the monk still dies of old age when his time is up.

Tongue of the Sun and Moon (Ex): A monk of 17th level or higher can speak with any living creature.

Empty Body (Su): At 19th level, a monk gains the ability to assume an ethereal state for 1 minute as though using the spell etherealness. Using this ability is a move action that consumes 3 points from his ki pool. This ability only affects the monk and cannot be used to make other creatures ethereal.

Perfect Self: At 20th level, a monk becomes a magical creature. He is forevermore treated as an outsider rather than as a humanoid (or whatever the monk's creature type was) for the purpose of spells and magical effects. Additionally, the monk gains damage reduction 10/chaotic, which allows him to ignore the first 10 points of damage from any attack made by a nonchaotic weapon or by any natural attack made by a creature that doesn't have similar damage reduction. Unlike other outsiders, the monk can still be brought back from the dead as if he were a member of his previous creature type.

Ultimate Technique: At 20th level, a Monk learns the Ultimate Technique of his Way.

Transcendent Mantra (Ex): At 20th level, a Monk's ability to enter a meditative state has reached perfection. The Competence Bonus granted by his Mantra is raised to +8, and he may begin his Mantra as an Immediate Action. Additionally, when he ends his Mantra, its effects persist for a number of Rounds equal to 1/2 his Monk level.

MONK WAYS

Way of the Boar
Philosophy: Adherents of the Way of the Boar value physical strength and unrelenting assaults above all else. Practitioners of the Way of the Boar gain a bonus to Strength when chanting a Mantra.

Way Abilities:
[i]Boar's Rush (Ex): At 2nd level, while chanting his Mantra, a practitioner of the Way of the Boar gains a Competence Bonus on damage rolls made as part of a charge and on Combat Maneuver checks made to Overrun equal to 1/2 his Monk Level.

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Way of the Dog
Philosophy: Adherents of the Way of the Dog value teamwork and pack tactics most. Practitioners of the Way of the Dog gain a bonus to Charisma when chanting a Mantra.

Way Abilities:
Packleader's Howl (Ex): At 2nd level, while chanting a Mantra, a practitioner of the Way of the Dog may grant a Morale Bonus on Attack rolls and AC to all allies besides himself equal to 1/2 the bonus granted to himself by his Mantra.

Special Techniques:

Ki Powers

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Way of the Dragon
Philosophy: Adherents of the Way of the Dragon value force of personality and commanding presence more than brute force. Practitioners of the Way of the Dragon gain a bonus to Charisma when chanting a Mantra.

Way Abilities:
Forceful Ki: At 2nd level, practitioners of the Way of the Dragon add their Charisma Bonus to AC and CMD instead of Wisdom. In addition, when a practitioner of the Way of the Dragon gains a Ki Pool, he uses his Charisma modifier instead of Wisdom when determining the size of his Ki Pool.

Special Techniques:

Ki Powers:
Ki Blast (Su): As a Standard Action, a practitioner of the Way of the Dragon may spend 1 Ki to make a ranged touch attack against a target that deals 1d6 damage per 2 Monk levels plus his Charisma modifier.

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Way of the Goat - Wis

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Way of the Horse - Con

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Way of the Monkey - Int

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Way of the Ox
Philosophy: Adherents to the Way of the Ox value physical toughness and resiliency above swiftness and dodging. Practitioners of the Way of the Ox gain a bonus to Constitution while chanting a Mantra.

Way Abilities:
Thick Skin: At 2nd level, while chanting a Mantra, a practitioner of the Way of the Ox gains a bonus to Natural Armor equal to 1/2 his Monk Level.

Special Techniques:

Ki Powers:
Iron Hide: As a Standard Action, a practitioner of the Way of the Ox may spend 1 Ki point to gain DR1/- for every 4 Levels in Monk, for a number of rounds equal to his Monk Level.

Reikido: As a Move Action, a practitioner of the Way of the Ox may touch a subject and spend any amount of Ki. The touched subject gains a number of Temporary Hit Points equal twice the amount of Ki spent. These Temporary Hit Points last for a number of Rounds equal to the practitioner of the Way of the Ox's levels in Monk, or until fully expended, whichever comes first.

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Way of the Rabbit - Dex

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Way of the Rat - Int

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Way of the Rooster - Wis

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Way of the Snake - Dex

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Way of the Tiger - Str

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Way of the Cat
Philosophy: Adherents to the Way of the Cat value versatility above all else, and avoid strict compliances with conventionality. When beginning a Mantra, a Practitioner of the Cat chooses 2 Ability Scores. He gains a +2 Competence Bonus to each of those scores, instead of +4 to one. When he gains Powerful Mantra, the bonuses become to a +4 to one and +2 to the other. When he gains Transcendent Mantra, the bonuses to both Ability Scores increases to +4 each.

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So, a little bit of a tl;dr summary:

The Monk still retains all original Ki powers, as they're "generic" Monk abilities found in pretty much every Wuxia story and folktales involving Xians.

However, every Monk ALSO must adhere to 1 of 13 "Ways" - martial philosophies based on the Chinese Zodiac (plus the Cat, an aspect of the Japanese version of the Zodiac legend). Monks' Ways are a bit similar to Cavalier Orders, but provide a defining Stat that is increased while the Monk chants a Mantra during combat.

Ways also are a bit different in that they don't grant extra Class Skills; instead, they provide a pool of additional Ki Powers and "Techniques" - special attacks that can be made during combat.

Ways and Mantras pretty much take center stage in providing lots of options to the Monk, but the basic skeleton also gets a boost - a slowly-increasing boost to Flurry (by lv9 it removes the penalties from the two-weapon fighting aspects Flurry, and by lv13 you actually get an effective BONUS while Flurrying); Monks also always count their Monk Levels as their BAB when meeting the prereqs of Feats and PrCs.

Anyway, what I kinda need help on are the Ways - I have the names (obviously - that was easy) and their associated Stats, but I only have a few Way Abiilities, I have NO Techniques (mostly because I don't know how those work in the Unchained Monk), and I only have a few Ki Powers.

I'd like for there to be a fair variety of Ki Powers for each Way - some that cost Ki, some that simply require you to have Ki in your Pool, the same way that Deeds may cost Grit/Panache or may just need you to have at least 1 Grit/Panache left

Posting in another thread, I had an idea that probably wouldn't work as a product, but for anyone so inclined who owns the PDF, seems like a not-terrible idea:

When you download a PDF, you are given multiple means of downloading it - one file per chapter, one file per chapter lite, single file, etc.

Does anyone actually ever Download the Zip file containing the broken-down chapters, print them out, and then keep them bound together into multiple booklets & pamphlets?

As I said, it doesn't seem like it'd work as a product (the production costs for making something like this would be hilariously prohibitive I'd imagine, with a final MSRP pushing $70+ dollars, even IF made in softbacks), but it does make things a bit more manageable for players and DMs alike when sitting down at an actual table.

For instance, the Core Rulebook could be broken down so that each Race, Class, and Prestige Class gets its own individual sheet or Pamplet, with the following groupings of all other Chapters:

Character Basics: Chapters 4, 5, & 7 (Skills, Feats, & Additional Rules)

Combat: Chapter 8 by itself (Combat)

Magic: Chapters 9 & 10 (Magic & Spells)

Equipment: Chapters 6 & 15 (Equipment & Magic Items)

Gamemastering: Chapters 12, 13, & 14 (Gamemastering, Environment, & Creating NPCs)

Appendices

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I'm kinda curious if people have tried it, and if so, how effective has it been in practice?

Stamina seems like a bit of a successor to the Martial Maneuvers system introduced in 3.5's Tomb of Battle, especially with the whole "replenishes between combat" thing.

You get tricks based on your Combat Feat choices, and while most classes dealing with Combat Feats will be as static as the Spells Known list of a Sorcerer, other classes are a bit more fluid with how they deal with Combat Feats.

Obviously, the Fighter and Warpriest get the biggest set-in-stone values, since both classes can get as many Combat Feats as they have Character Levels, and thus can have all manners of Feats and their Stamina abilities.

But how exactly does the system mesh with the Cavalier and other classes which use Tactician or a Tactician-like ability? Many Teamwork Feats are also Combat Feats, so when you use Tactician to grant Teamwork Feats to other players, you'll also be granting the Stamina tricks of those Feats as well, right?

And then there's the whole matter of Martial Flexibility. Having access to theoretically ANY Combat Feat in the game at any time is already a crazy-cool ability, but now that there's the whole new dynamic of having both the initial Feat ability as well as its Stamina ability adding to decisions.

Abilities like Tactician and Martial Flexibility USED to dictate what Feats were worth taking (and maybe granting) simply at face-value, but now with Stamina, is it a little bit more gray? Are their cases of odd-man Feats that can/should be chosen as fuel for Tactician or MF, simply because their Stamina abilities are great, or does the primary, non-Stamina ability of a Feat still rule when making choices for these abilities, with Stamina potentially just being icing on the cake?

Okay, so, people get really butthurt about Iterative Attacks.

Frankly, I think they should just basically stuff it and get over it; however, I do think there's some room to play with Iterative Attacks if that's your thing (I've played games where the DM has everyone write their turns down on a card and then pass them in, to simulate the simultaneity of action that a turn is supposed to represent - not perfect in the least, but a kinda neat idea).

This alternate system is pretty simple - it uses the exact same setup as now for highest BAB, but instead of making multiple Attacks all on your turn, you spread them out throughout the round.

When your Base Attack Bonus reaches +6, you gain an additional Attack at your Base Attack Bonus, made on your Initiateive -5. At Base Attack Bonus +11 and every +5 higher, you more additional Attacks, made at a cumulative -5 to Initiative.

For example: If a Fighter with Base Attack Bonus +11 rolls a 13 for Initiative, he makes his first Attack at Initiative 13, his second at Initiative 8, and his third at Initiative 3.

When you can make multiple Attacks in a round, you may hold your Initiative until you reach your lowest Initiative for attacks, and make all Attacks during the same Initiative.

For example: If a Fighter with Base Attack Bonus +11 rolls a 13 for Initiative, he may hold Initiative until Initiative 3, and then make all 3 of his attacks during that Initiative.

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This would help with people who don't like you making multiple attacks during a turn.

You could even combine this with a rule that you can break up your movement between these initiative ticks, so you could move and attack multiple times.

Well, Unchained is coming out in a little over 2 weeks, so in preparation I wanted to get the jump on the bandwagon and start the conga-line of Bloat threads a little early.

Because, as we know, PFU is set to absolutely and forever ruin Pathfinder, just like the Advanced Player's Guide, Ultimate Combat, Ultimate Magic, Advanced Race Guide, Advanced Class Guide, Ultimate Equipment, GameMastery Guide, Ultimate Campaign, NPC Codex, Monster Codex, Mythic Adventures, and Bestiaries 2-4 completely ruined Pathfinder before it.

The question is, HOW is Pathfinder Unchained going to "RUIN PATHFINDER FOR-EVAR!!!"?

I personally think it's going to ruin everything by instituting a requirement whereby players must attach angry squirrels to their nether-regions before making a Combat Maneuver, while simultaneously having Paizo send a player a check for $23 every time they use a Social Skill in place of roleplaying - with a bonus $5 if you refuse to roleplay your character AT ALL, and instead simply communicate in character EXCLUSIVELY by rolling combinations of Intimidate, Diplomacy, and Bluff checks!

And just remember, everybody - it's gonna be the Bloatiest Bloat that ever Bloated!

There are lots of attempts to make Critical Hit charts, though they're often pretty complex and/or are absurdly brutal.

I don't mind brutality, but it'd be nice if there were a fairly simple way to score specific Critical Hits that can have a range of believable effects.

So my group and I came up with a fairly simple solution, using the existing rules for Called Shots, and making use of the oft-unloved d12.

All it takes is making a small chart, associating the numbers rolled with an area hit.

Thankfully, Paizo sells a Hit Location Die, ready to go, as well.

Basically, when you score a Critical Hit, roll a d12 or the Hit Location Die.

On a 2/Stomach (vitals), 4/Left Arm (arm, left), 5/Left Foot (leg, left), 6/Right Leg (leg, right), 7/Left Leg (leg, left), 8/Right Foot (leg, right), 10/Right Arm (arm, right), or 11/Full Body (chest) apply the normal rules for a Critical Called Shot.

On a 1/Head (head), 3/Left Hand (arm, left), 9/Right Hand (arm, right), or 12/Chest (chest), roll a d% and apply the according Effects, listed bellow:

d12/HIT LOCATION DIE (CALLED SHOT LOCATION) - EFFECT
1/Head (Head) - d%: 01-50 - Head Critical Called Shot; 51-58 - Eye Critical Called Shot (Right); 59-66 - Eye Critical Called Shot (Left); 67-75 - Ear Critical Called Shot (Right); 76-84 - Ear Critical Called Shot (Left); 85-00 - Neck Critical Called Shot
2/Stomach (Vitals) - Vitals Critical Called Shot
3/Left Hand (Left Arm)_d%: 01-50 - Arm Critical Called Shot; 51-00 - Hand Critical Called Shot
4/Left Arm (Left Arm) - Arm Critical Called Shot
5/Left Foot (Left Leg) - Leg Critical Called Shot
6/Right Leg (Right Leg) - Leg Critical Called Shot
7/Left Leg (Left Leg) - Leg Critical Called Shot
8/Right Foot (Right Leg) - Leg Critical Called Shot
9/Right Hand (Right Arm) - d%: 01-50 - Arm Critical Called Shot; 51-00 - Hand Critical Called Shot
10/Right Arm (Right Arm) - Arm Critical Called Shot
11/Full Body (Chest) - Chest Critical Called Shot
12/Chest (Chest) - d%: 01-75 Chest Critical Called Shot; 76-00 Heart Critical Hit Called Shot

If enough damage is scored to cause a Debilitating Blow, replace the Critical Hit Called Shot effects with the appropriate Debilitating Blow effect.

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Example 1:

An enemy attacks Tim with a Keen Kukri and scores a Critical Hit.

The DM rolls damage and the Hit Location Die, rolling Head.

The DM Rolls a d%, and rolls a 53, indicating that it hit Tim's Right Eye.

The damage is not enough to score a Debilitating Blow, so the Critical just activates the Critical Called Shot effects as if the attack were a Called Shot:

A critical hit to the eye costs the target sight in that eye for 1d4 minutes. The target also suffers the effects of a called shot to the eye for that duration.

A called shot to the eye gives all of the target’s foes concealment against its attacks for 1 round and gives it a –2 penalty on Perception checks. If the creature only has one functional eye prior to the called shot, it is blinded for 1 round instead.

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Example 2:

Sara attacks an enemy with a Composite Longbow, and scores a Critical Hit.

Sara rolls damage and the Hit Location Die, rolling Full Body, which automatically scors a Chest Critical Called Shot.

A critical hit to the chest deals 1d4 points of Constitution damage and fatigues the target. A successful Fortitude saving throw (made after the Constitution damage is applied) negates the fatigue. The creature also suffers the effects of a called shot to the chest.

A called shot to the chest deals no additional damage, but any skill checks caused by the hit (such as an Acrobatics check while balancing or a Climb check while climbing) take a –2 penalty.

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Example 3:

An Ogre Mage Oni attacks Rory with a Huge +3 Impact Keen Katana, scoring a Critical Hit.

The DM rolls for damage, dealing 55 total damage (Rory's total HP is 90), and rolls the Hit Location Die.

The DM rolls Left Leg, dealing a Debilitating Blow to Rory's Left Leg:

A debilitating blow to the leg knocks the creature prone. The blow renders the leg entirely useless until healed unless the target succeeds at a Fortitude saving throw. If the saving throw fails by 5 or more, the leg is severed or otherwise mangled such that only regeneration or similar effects can repair it. If the save succeeds, the target is instead lamed and moves at half speed until the leg is healed, or until it receives a successful DC 20 Heal check. A creature with a useless or severed leg moves at half speed if it still has more than half of its legs usable; otherwise, it cannot stand up and must crawl to move. The target also suffers the effects of a called shot to the leg (if the leg remains usable) for 2d6 minutes.

If a saving throw is allowed on a called shot, the DC is equal to the Armor Class hit by the attack. In the case of an attack roll of a natural 20, the DC is the AC the attack would have hit if 20s did not automatically hit.

Rory rolls his Saving Throw and fails by 7. His Left Leg is severed.

Just for giggles, my group sometimes does "theme" groups running through an adventure, typically with the build of: Full-caster Offense, Half-Caster, Pseudo-caster (4/9), Ranged Martial, Melee Martial, Supporter

We've done:

Holy League of America - Cleric, Warpriest, Paladin, Inquisitor, Divine Hunter Warrior of Holy Light, Holy Guide Holy Tactician Warrior of Holy Light Paladin

Captain Planet and the Asskickers: Druid, Hunter, Ranger, Skirmisher Ranger, Wild Child Brawler, Beast Rider Cavalier

Arcane Avengers: Arcanist, Magus, Bloodrager, Myrmidarch Magus, Synthesist Summoner, Bard

League Of Ordinary Gentlemen: Alchemist, Investigator, Counterfeit Mage Rogue, Guide Skirmisher Ranger, Slayer, Standard-Bearer Cavalier/Sensei Monk/Battle Herald

Crouching Tigers: Qinggong Monk, Master of Many Styles/Sacred Fist, Qinggong Monk, Zen Archer, Brawler, Sensei Wanderer Monk

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Now we're thinking of running:

The Rage Brigade: Barbarian/Sorcerer/Dragon Disciple, Barbarian/Warsighted Oracle/Rage Prophet, Bloodrager, Archer Fighter/Stalwart Defender, Invulnerable Rager Barbarian, and then, to round things out, a Skald.

Buuut, the problem is that a Skald typically makes OTHER party members rage along with himself, which is... kinda useless when everyone else has Rage or a Rage-equivalent ability.

So the player who's going to be the Skald wants to be a Spell-Warrior Skald.

I'm not gonna say "no" to him, but do I need to worry about him being less effective than a typical Skald, or is he going to be okay with that?

I'm trying to make a scary Gunslinger for my players to fight.

Ifrits are kinda busted wide open for a Myseterious Stranger, since Wildfire Heart gives a +4 to Initiative, and Reactionary gives +2

Add on top of that its +1/2 Bonus with Gunslinger's Initiative, and you're looking at a freakishly-fast little bugger already.

But, there's more.

Dagger-Pistols count as melee weapons, yet are Firearms. That means that a lv3 Gunslinger can draw a firearm as part of the initiative.

And since it's a Melee weapon, it can have Dueling placed on it for 14,000gp.

So here's my question:

Would it be fare, when Initiative is rolled, to have the Ifrit draw the Dagger Pistol just to gain that additional +4 in total, or does Dueling mean it has to be in the hand BEFORE Initiative is triggered?

(He actually uses Double-Barreled Pistols, but with Quick Draw & Gun Twirling, he immediately switches out the Dagger-Pistol with his two primary weapons)

Classes Mysterious Stranger Gunslinger / Guide Urban Ranger / Tactician Fighter

Traits Reactionary (Init +2) Initative +2
Race Wildfire Heart (Init +4) Initiative +6; FCA: +1/2 Gunslinger's Initiative
CL1 Myst1 Weapon Focus (Double-Barreled Pistol)
CL2 Myst2
CL3 Myst3 Quick Draw, Gunslinger's Initiative (Init +2) FCA (Init +1); Initiative +9
CL4 Myst4 Dazzling Display; FCA (Init +2) Initiative +10
CL5 Rng1 Gun Twirling
CL6 Rng2 Precise Strike
CL7 Myst5 Rapid Reload
CL8 Myst6 Initiative +11
CL9 Myst7 Two-Weapon Fighting
CL10 Myst8 Improved Two-Weapon Fighting; Initiative +12
CL11 Tact1 Greater Two-Weapon Fighting, Point-Blank Shot
CL12 Tact2 Improved Initiative, Tactical Awareness; Initiative +13
Dueling Dagger Pistol (Init +4) Initiative +17

Benefit: You are considered to be flanking an opponent if at least two of your allies are threatening that opponent, regardless of your actual positioning.

Normal: You must be positioned opposite an ally to flank an opponent.

Don't you normally count as your own ally? Gang up says that if at least two of your allies are threatening the same opponent you are considered to be flanking. Doesn't that mean that if you and one other ally threaten the same target then you flank?

Ally: Do you count as your own ally?

You count as your own ally unless otherwise stated or if doing so would make no sense or be impossible. Thus, "your allies" almost always means the same as "you and your allies."

I think it's pretty obvious that the RAI was that you and two OTHER allies had to gang up on a monster, and normally I'd argue AGAINST that heavy an RAW reading, but honestly I am SO okay with the "you need two allies and you are your own ally, so you just need someone else" reading because ANYTHING that makes it easier to Rogues to Sneak Attack is welcome in my book.

Anyway, is there any way we can get an amen on this?

Made it through the Tomb of Horrors.

Took the Bag of Holding from the Siren instead of freeing the Siren.

Opened up Acererak's Chamber.

THREW THE BAG OF HOLDING OVER THE DEMILICH, RAN BACK TO THE MOUTH OF THE GREAT GREEN DEVIL AND THREW THE BAG OF HOLDING WITH ACERERAK INSIDE INTO THE DEVIL'S MOUTH.

To say the least, I was bemused. Utterly speechless, stupified, and bemused.

And laughing my ass off.

Rogues get a lot of flack for being underpowered because Sneak Attack is hard to pull off and because they have low BAB.

So while Sneak Attack is heinously powerful, it's not very often you get to do it, since it's very hard to meet the "Denied Dex or Flanking" requirements.

Unless you find a way to make sure that you can do it.

Traits Blade of the Society, Reactionary
Race Two-Weapon Fighting
CL1 Rog1 Double Slice
CL2 Rog1 Finesse Rogue
CL3 Rog1 Combat Expertise
CL4 Rog1 Weapon Training
CL5 Rog1 Improved Dirty Trick
CL6 Rog1 Minor Magic - ???, Major Magic - True Strike
CL7 Rog1 ???
CL8 Rog1 Combat Trick - Improved Two-Weapon Fighting
CL9 Rog1 Quick Dirty Trick
CL10 Rog1 Rogue Talent - Feat: Quicken Spell-Like Ability (Major Magic - True Strike)
CL11 Rog1 ???
CL12 Rog1 Hunter's Surprise, ???

Mind you, this'd only work for Home games (since Monster feats aren't legal in PFS), and it doesn't come online until 10th level, but being able to use True Strike as a Swift Action twice daily to gain a free +20 to Dirty Trick to Blind your opponent (and thus deny them their Dex to AC), is pretty sick regardless.

In a comic I draw, the main characters play Pathfinder, and in one storyline their characters were shown.

Since I was already coming up with profile images for these RPG characters, I had the idea to use them as prints for an upcoming convention I'm attending.

Then the idea came up to use the images on functional character sheets (albeit pretty substantially redesigned from the typical layout, but still a character sheet), and selling those as prints, though at much less than a typical full-illustration print.

I'm going to put a "Permission to photocopy for personal use" at the bottom, plus "Pathfinder © Paizo Publishing, LLC", along with a copyright covering my own characters and their character designs, but would I need to include anything else?

So, working on some art and prints for an upcoming convention, I drew the Pathfinder character of one of the main characters of a comic I draw.

Then I thought "hey, I can make characters sheets with this!"

I had to design a custom character sheet to work with this idea, and figured "y'know, people might like this", so I removed my own IP stuff (gotta love layers), and left the rest.

Anyway, I made a Character Sheet with space for a full-body portrait of a character!

There are Domains, Specialization Schools, Bloodlines, Inquisitions, Blessings...

Am I missing anything from the PRD?

I'm trying to cover all bases here for something I'm working on, and I'm trying to think of anything I'm missing.

How would this work?

Say you have Irori as your god, and you use Holy Ice Weapon to create your Deity's Favored Weapon - does ice form around your hands, allowing you to deal the extra Ice Damage?

Or do you have to form Gauntlets?

What do you do?

Don't know if I'll go about making a Battle Herald Guide, since one already exists, but I did go about compiling many of the possible Battle Herald builds available in their various combinations and strategies.

Before we get into specific builds, there're a few classes which need to be called out that let you even THINK about getting into a Battle Herald

Cavalier: This class is absolutely necessary, because it's the only class that gets the Challenge ability. There are a few Archetypes which can work well, but the majority listed here make use of the Strategist Archetype. Strategist does two important things for this build:

1) It ups your Tactician ability to one every 4 Cavalier levels (this becomes relevant once you hit Battle Herald, since its levels stack with Cavalier to determine your Tactician ability.

2) It replaces Expert Trainer with Drill Instructor. Spend ten minutes and a use of Challenge in order to grant a Teamwork Feat to your allies for 1 minute per 2 levels of Cavalier. True, this ability requires you have time to prepare before a fight, and that the fight will happen within the next few minutes, but trust me on this - it's a lot more useful than "reduce the time to teach your Mount a new trick", especially when Downtime is in effect.

Bard: The original other half of this build. It provides Inspire Courage at 1st level, lots of skills, a good amount of spellcasting, and a few other support-based abilities.

Evangelist: A Cleric Archetype, and another source of Inspire Courage at level 1. You also get 1 Domain, Divine Spells, the ability to Channel, and the ability to burn prepared spells for the spell, Command, at level 1.

Sensei: A Monk Archetype, and the third source of Inspire Courage at level 1. You don't get Flurry of Blows, Fast Movement, but you do get Improved Unarmed Strike as usual, your Unarmed damage is increased to 1d6, Stunning Fist as a Bonus Feat, another Bonus Combat Feat, and you won't really feel like you've lost anything because you hit a brick wall in regards to spell progression once you enter Battle Herald. Oh, and your saves will be GLORIOUS.

Exemplar: Here's a strange and wonderful thing - a Brawler Archetype which not only grants Inspire Courage at 3rd level, but also grants Tactician at 5, counting it's levels as Cavalier levels for determining Tactician. It's a fairly big level investment, but in the long run it really pays off. It also happens to be the only class that grants Inspire Courage that also has full Base Attack Bonus and a d10 HD, meaning builds which use this Class are the toughest have the greatest natural accuracy, and have access to Martial Flexibility.

These four classes - Bard, Evangelist, Sensei, and Exemplar - are the only classes, so far, which can be used in conjunction with Cavalier to gain entrance to Battle Herald (anyone who tells you that Pathfinder Chronicler can do it is a liar and should be shot - that's like going around the world to walk five feet).

And now, onto the War Room:

ARCANE WARLORDS - Conchobar-Class
Strategist Cavalier 1-4 / Bard 1-4 / Battle Herald

Ironically, this is the setup that Paizo had envisioned for the Battle Herald, despite the myriad other ways to make it happen now that're in many ways more exciting and potentially better. So, getting into "vanilla" territory here, this is a solid-yet-mediocre method of going about becoming a Battle Herald.

The one thing to remember about the Battle Herald is that there is a glaring lack of "Spellcaster Level" progression in the class, despite requiring an ability which was originally only obtainable from an Arcane class. That means that you're going to run into a wall of spellcasting potential very quickly.

The other issue at hand is that, for every level of martial progression that you trade for spellcasting, your HP is statistically going to be worse (obviously rolling 7 on a d8 is better than 1 on a d10, but we're going with averages here, people). The GOOD news is that, at least up through Bard 4, you're not going to notice any difference in your Base Attack Bonus at all compared to if you had taken, say, one level of Sensei Monk.

So, how should you do this? Well, that's up to you.

Cav 1 / Bard 4 / Battle Herald produces the squishiest Battle Herald, but gives you access to 2nd Level spells.

Cav 4 / Bard 1 / Battle Herald gives you basically nonexistent spellcasting, but will grant you Field Instruction and more use of Tactician once you hit even Battle Herald 1.

Cav 2 / Bard 3 / Battle Herald makes the best use of your levels - you get all the Level 1-3 abilities of the Bard, along with the Level 2 Order ability of the Cavalier.

Cav 3 / Bard 2 / Battle Herald is kind of a waste; you get less spellcasting than Cav2/Brd3, and you can't apply Cavalier's Charge to an ally, unlike Inspire Competence.

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CRUSADE COMMANDERS - Joan d'Arc-Class
Strategist Cavalier 1-4 / Evangelist Cleric 1-4 / Battle Herald

Now HERE'S some fun nonsense. Quick riddle - what's got the Base Attack Bonus and HD of a bard, but faster spell progression, is Divine, and has an Archetype that lets it get Inspire Courage? That's right - the good ol' Cleric.

The Evangelist only gets one Domain, but that's more than what a Bard gets. On top of that, it can spontaneously cast Command, or (if you've gone up to 3rd level) Enthrall. And, of course, the free Weapon Proficiency if you worship the right deity.

How to plot out this one:

While you can definitely go Cavalier 4 / Cleric 1 / Battle Herald, it seems like it'd be a bit of a waste in this regard. Rather, I'd suggest either Cavalier 2 / Cleric 3 / Battle Herald, so that you get up to 2nd level spells AND still get your level 2 Order Ability, or even go all-out with this and hit Cavalier 1 / Cleric 4.

You still suffer from the same issues as a Bard (lower HP, no spell progression from Battle Herald, etc.), but it's much less of an issue when you add in the greater spell progression, Domain ability, and spell list.

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SCHOLARLY GENERALS - Napoleon-Class
Strategist Cavalier 1-4 / Sensei Monk 1-4 / Battle Herald

This is a pure-martial build that makes use of the Sensei Archetype. Like the previous builds, you have your choices of how you mix and match Cavalier and Sensei in your first five levels, but with this build, it's a little more forgiving no matter what combo you take:

Cav1/Sensei4/Herald: Challenge, Tactician, a Monk Bonus Feat at first level, Stunning Fist, an AC Bonus equal to your Wis+1, Insightful Strike (which lets you attack with your Wisdom modifier using Unarmed strikes or Monk weapons), Inspire Greatness, Still Mind, Maneuver Training, a Ki Pool, and 1d8 damage with Unarmed Strike.

Cav2/Sensei3/Herald: Challenge, Tactician, a 2nd level Order Ability, a Monk Bonus Feat at first level, Stunning Fist, an AC Bonus equal to your Wis, Insightful Strike, Inspire Greatness, Still Mind, Maneuver Training, and 1d6 damage with Unarmed Strike.

Cav3/Sensei2/Herald: Challenge, Tactician, a 2nd level Order Ability, Cavalier's Charge, a Monk Bonus Feat at first level, Stunning Fist, an AC Bonus equal to your Wis, Insightful Strike, and 1d6 damage with Unarmed Strike.

Cav4/Sensei1/Herald: Challenge, Tactician, a 2nd level Order Ability, Cavalier's Charge, Drill Instructor, a Monk Bonus Feat at first level, Stunning Fist, an AC Bonus equal to your Wis.

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MASTER TACTICIAN - Alexander-Class
Strategist Cavalier 1 / Exemplar 5 / Battle Herald

The Ultimate Tactician. You are built around one thing, and one thing only, but dear lord are you godly at it: Teamwork Feats. While this build delays entry into Battle Herald by a level, once Level 6 comes around, you see why it's so crazy - literally every level of this build is designed to increase your Cavalier level for the purposes of calculating Tactician, and to increase your knowledge of Teamwork Feats and how you can throw them onto your buddies.

For added hilarity, while you will probably be spending a large amount of time being full-support, you will also be one of the most resilient and effective melee fighters in your party, if not THE most resilient and effective.

The key to making this REALLY awesome is Crusader's Flurry and Close Weapon Mastery. Crusader's Flurry grants Two-Weapon Fighting to unarmed strikes and - here's the fun part - Close Group weapons, i.e. Shields; on top of this, you can Two-Weapon-Fight with just one hand. You have a Heavy Shield, which you are proficient with thanks to Cavalier, and you are REALLY good at making it into a "smashing-board of doom". At level 5, you get upped damage to your Close Group weapons. Or, of course, you can just ignore these and go about your business, but I still highly recommend using a shield, since your AC will be pretty spectacularly high

The only two downsides of this class are: you cannot enter Battle Herald until level 7, meaning the highest you'll be able to get is Battle Herald 6 in PFS; and your dependence on providing Teamwork Feats for your allies means that you're not fantastic at soloing enemies. However, 12 HD of d10s, full BAB, and Martial Flexibility mean that you won't be in a very bad

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FRONTLINE COMMANDER - Leonidas-Class
Strategist Cavalier 1-2 / Exemplar 3 / Fighter 0-1 / Battle Herald

Rather than focusing mainly on granting your allies Teamwork Feats, you adopt a more general combat style. You drop your dependence on Exemplar to the bare minimum - Level 3 - and either increase your Cavalier level to 2 (in order to gain the Order Ability), or utilize that last level with a dip into Fighter. The best choices for Fighter would be either Tactician Fighter (more skill points) or Unbreakable Fighter (may as well get 2 feats for the price of one level).

You effectively lose 3 levels of Tactician, but gain more personal combat tricks. This is a bit better if you foresee yourself in positions where you'll be soloing enemies, or if your party is going to be split up in giant melees where they are too far from you to benefit from your abilities.

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WARRIOR-KING - Arthur-Class
Strategist Standard-Bearer Cavalier 4 / (Sensei 1/Bard 1/Evangelist 1) / Battle Herald

You ARE the king of your party. You were born to do 2 things: hold a Banner and grant Teamwork feats. You drop your Mount entirely, and instead devote all your levels but 1 to building up your Banner Bonus (up to +3 at either level 11), and Tactician ability. Field Instructor and Tactician together mean you are going to be granting tons of Teamwork Feats, and Banner plus your Inspired Command mean you are pumping ALL your allies up to hideous levels of efficiency.

Your BAB is 1 behind other pure-martials, your HP takes a slight dip, and you do lose your Mount, but you're still a combat monster, and the shear level of synergy you have with the rest your party more than makes up for the minor sacrifices.

Alternatively, you can delay entry into Battle Herald by one level in order to pick up a Mount at Cavalier 5; if your DM allows Boon Companion, this may be an option, but I feel it's weaker than just getting more levels out of Battle Herald.

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TANK COMMANDER - Hannibal-Class
Beastrider Gendarme Cavalier 4 / (Sensei 1/Bard 1/Evangelist 1) / Battle Herald

You are a mounted terror. Emphasis on the TERROR. You ride a thing. That thing is BIG. The point of this build is to lead the charge straight into combat. You've heard of the Light Brigade? Yeah, you're not those pusses - you're the freakin' Afrika Korps, and you're riding a goddang PANZER VIII MAUS (don't know what that is? Look it up. Go ahead; I'll wait).

While you lose out on one of the more "commander" aspects (mostly, Tactician) at least until you hit lv10 - you are definitely commander that enemies won't want to mess with.

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PARAGON MARSHAL - Charlemagne-Class
Strategist Cavalier 1 / (Sensei 1/Bard 1/Evangelist 1) / Holy Tactician Paladin 3 / Battle Herald

This is a pretty serious departure from the other builds, but ends up being deceptively nasty. By dipping only 1 level deep into both Cavalier and your second class, you leave three levels open before you can enter Battle Herald. And it just so happens that not only does Paladin fit by virtue of being a full-BAB Martial, it also has a cute little Archetype called Holy Tactician that plays extremely well into the build.

The first-level ability, Weal's Champion, adds a small bit of Smite-like damage, but the kicker is the third level abilities - one grants a bonus Teamwork Feat, and the second, Battlefield Presence, is not-Tactician; you take a Standard Action and grant every Ally in a 30ft. radius one Teamwork Feat you know, AND you may switch it as a Swift Action. This doesn't have a daily limit nor duration, either. While this doesn't progress with Battle Herald, sadly, it's more than worth the 3-level wade into Paladin territory to make such a useful commander.

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BARE-FISTED COMMONDANT - Beowulf-Class
Cavalier 1 / Master of Many Styles Monk 1 / Exemplar 3 / Battle Herald

Not every commander wields a sword and shield. Some of 'em prefer pure hand-to-hand beatdowns. Since Exemplars already get Brawler's Flurry and increased damage with their fists, it makes sense to play this up. Take a dip into Master of Many Styles, and you have a really nasty little beat-machine.

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CAPTAIN OF THE MUSKETEERS - D'Artagan-Class
Daring Champion Cavalier 1 / (Sensei 1/Bard 1/Evangelist 1) / Mysterious Stranger Gunslinger 1 / Fighter 2 / Battle Herald

The name alone should tell you what this is. You're focused on two stats - Dex and Cha - and both play into your abilities fantastically. A little on the feat-heavy side, but you do everything with FLARE, baby.

Obviously, you'll want to take Slashing Grace with this build (as a Daring Champion), so that you're dealing both Dex to attack AND damage with your one-handed slashing weapons.

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LEADER OF MERRY MEN - Robin Hood-Class
Luring Cavalier 1 / (Sensei 1/Bard1/Evangelist1) / Hooded Champion Ranger 2 / Fighter 1 / Battle Herald

Again, pretty straightforward here. You take Hooded Champion Ranger because not only do you gain Archery Combat Style at level 2, you gain Panache, which is Charisma-based, which falls right in line with one of the stats you're already going to focus on. This is a class of Battle Herald which definitely plays on the back lines, safely out of harm's way, letting you call out commands without fear of getting offed.

Much like D'Artagnan-Class Battle Heralds, you can focus much more heavily on Dex with this build, and basically not worry about Strength at all.

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GUNNERY SARGEANT - Nobunaga-Class
Strategist Musketeer Luring Cavalier 4 / (Sensei 1/Bard 1/Evangelist 1) / Battle Herald

Guns are cheating. Good. Because cheating works - PHENOMENALLY. You combine the insanity of Far Challenge with the hilarity of Muskets. You also take advantage of this setup by utilizing not only Tactician but Drill Instructor Instruction in order to teach your allies how to be as awesome as you.

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HONOR-SWORN LORD - Date Masamune-Class
Samurai 1-3 / (Exemplar 3/Sensei 1/Bard 1/Evangelist 1) / Swashbuckler 0-3 / Fighter 0-3 / Battle Herald

So, here's a bit of an odd build. It uses the Samurai Alternate Class as its basis, instead of the original Cavalier. There's a very, very good reason for this: KATANAS. No, seriously, this isn't some weeaboo nonsense - Katanas are excellent weapons, with their high crit-range, and they're roughly the same damage as a longsword. Oh, and one other reason - they're One-Handed Slashing Weapons. That means you have 5 paths to go with this:

Genbu (North) - Samurai 3 / Exemplar 3 / Battle Herald

Suzaku (South) - Samurai 1 / (Sensei 1/Bard 1/Cleric 1) / Swashbuckler 3 / Battle Herald

Seiryuu (East) - Samurai 1 / Exemplar 3 / Swashbuckler 1 / Battle Herald

Byakko (West) - Samurai 3 / (Sensei 1/Bard 1/Cleric 1) / Fighter 1 / Battle Herald

Koryuu (Center) - Samurai 1 / (Sensei 1/Bard 1/Cleric 1) / Swashbuckler 1 / Fighter 2 / Battle Herald

The Genbu Path takes Samurai to level 3, in order to gain the Weapon Expertise class ability. This ability grants an effect identical to Quick Draw, and grants a +2 bonus to confirm Critical Hits (which is great with the Katana); it also counts your Samurai levels as Fighter levels, which works great with Exemplar, which ALSO counts as Fighter levels (meaning you'll count as a level 6 Fighter in total). Your entry into Battle Herald is delayed a level, but since you don't get Tactician through Samurai anyway, getting it later in your career from Battle Herald isn't a tragedy.

The Suzaku Path is similar to the D'Artagnan class build, in that it brings Dex and Charisma to the forefront again by focusing the build around the Swashbuckler class. Taking Slashing Grace means your Katana will be using Dex for both attack AND damage, and you've got a nasty crit range to boost. You also have Deeds, like Opportune Parry & Riposte, which means you'll be parrying with a Katana, which is just immeasurably awesome. By taking Swashbuckler to level 3, you also gain Precise Strike and Swashbuckler Initiative.

The Seiryuu Path, like the Suzaku Path, utilizes Swashbuckler Finesse and Slashing Grace to turn your Katana into a very formidable weapon that uses your Dex to both attack and damage and has a high crit range.

The Byakko Path takes a similar route as the Genbu route, but uses 1 level of Bard, Evangelist, or Sensei, and 1 level of Fighter, in order to enter into Battle Herald at the usual rate. You lose a BAB and your fighter Level only counts as 4, but that's more than enough for most feats you'll want to take.

The Koryuu Path, like its namesake, takes the center road on everything - the katana, the standard access rate granted by one of the one-level-dip classes, Dex-to-attack-and-damage from Swashbuckler's Finesse plus Slashing Grace, and 2 Bonus Combat Feats care of the Fighter.

I like to set my campaigns at various points in history, on a version of Earth where not just mythologies, but literary works like Burrows' version of Mars and the Cthulhu Mythos, are all real. Obviously, though, you wouldn't expect to see things like Satyrs running around China, nor elephants in Quebec.

So, for my own uses, I went through all four Bestiaries and figured out what real-world regions each creature owuld come from (based primarily on folklore and mythologies for fantastical creatures).

Then, I figured, since I already did the work, it might help other people to know what monsters come from what areas/works, in case they want to set campaigns in a fantasy version of the real world, or have equivalents of cultures.

The regions are broken down into large chunks based on overarching mythologies and cultures. Some, like Germania and Scandanavia, are very close but for a few differences between them, but others are radically different.

Here they are:

British Isles - England, Scotland, Ireland, Wales, etc.
halfling, elf, half-elf; angel, Barghest, bugbear, demon, green hag, hill giant, stone giant, night hag, ogre, orc, pixie, sea hag, wight, wraith, yeth hound, banshee, bodak, brownie, dullahan, gremlins, grindylow, kelpie, leprechaun, merrow, ogrekin, pech, redcap, revenant, spriggan; annis hag, atomie, faerie dragon, fey creature, nuckelavee; alpluachra, ankou, blood hag, buggane, changeling, demon lord, devilbound creature, fachen, gathlain, jack-o'-lantern, leanan sidhe, pookah, morrigna psychopomp, selkie, spring-heeled jack, fomorian titan, tooth fairy, wickerman, winter hag, ypotryll

Western Europe - Iberian Peninsula and France
elf, half-elf, gnome; Angel, cockatrice, demon, devil, gargoyle, aurochs, bison, nightmare, salamander, gnome, green hag, tarrasque, unicorn, wyvern; annis hag, drake, hippogriff, mandragora, revenant, sandman, sylph; alraune, giant ant lion, giant adult ant lion, faerie dragon, ecorche, sea hag, sprite; blood hag, cephalophore, demon lord, devilbound creature, Grendel, hypnalis, myrmecoleon, pard, peluda, rat king, ratling, sea cat (sea-lion), seps, juvenile seps, tooth fairy, vouivre, winter hag,

Germania - Netherlands and the Germanic nations (Switzerland, Germany, Austra, etc.)
dwarf, gnome, elf, half-elf, half-orc; angel, demon, devil, Doppleganger, drow, duergar, frost giant, aurochs, bison, fire giant, green hag, kobold, linnorm, night hag, orc, svirfneblin, worg, winter wolf worg; annis hag, revenant, water orm; nixie, norn, sea hag, sleipnir, tatzlwyrm, valkyrie; blood hag, cephalophore, demon lord, devilbound creature, einherjar, erlking, irminsul, lorelei, rat king, svartalfr, swan maiden, winter hag,

Scandanavia - Finland and the northern Baltic states, plus Iceland
dwarf, elf, half-elf, half-orc; angel, demon, devil drow, duergar, frost giant, fire giant, aurochs, kraken, linnorm, orc, trolls, worg, winter wolf worg; draugr, ice troll, rock troll, water orm; cephalophore, demon lord, Iku-Torso, norn, sleipnir, trollhound, valkyrie; blood hag, einherjar, fossegrim, huldra, svartalfr, swan maiden,

Eastern Europe - Czech Republic east, including Russia and the southern Baltic states, and south to the Caucusus
elf, half-elf; angel, demon, devil, drake, gargoyle, green hag, aurochs, bison, lich, night hag, nightmare, yeti; annis hag, dhampir, sea hag, taiga giant; gathlain, gorynych; blood hag, cephalophore, demon lord, leshy, nosoi psychopomp, rat king, ratling, rusalka, vodyanoi, nosferatu vampire, winter hag,

Mediterranean - The Greco-Roman region
angel, Centaur, chimera, cyclops, demon, devil, dryad, cloud giant, storm giant, gorgon (khalkotauri), griffon, harpy, hydra, lamia, medusa, minotaur, nymph, pegasus, satyr, sphinx (gynosphinx); amphisbaena, catoblepas, charybdis, daemons, hippocampus, nereid, oread, scylla, siren, titans, triton, undine; cerberi, great cyclops, unfettered eidolon, faun, stimphalidies, hekatonkheires; argus (argus panoptes), demon lord, dossenus, drakainia, graeae, hamadryad, karkinoi, lampad, maenad, oceanid, vanth psychopomp, udaeus (spartoi), xanthos,

Middle East - From Turkey south to the Arabian Peninsula, east until China and India, and North to Uzbekistan
Archon, Azata, genie, iron cobra, manticore, roc, tiger, dire tiger; Aeon, clockwork golem, camel, ifrit, glacier toad, qlippoth; thalassic behemoth (leviathan), thunder behemoth, clockworks, divs, dybbuk, ghul, girtablilu, humbaba, Lammasu, nephilim, peri, shedu, simurgh, suli, tophet; almiraj, apocalypse locust, barometz (vegetable-lamb of tartary), clockwork dragon, elohim, gearghost, rukh, shulsaga, taniniver,

Egypt/North Africa - Lands of the Sahara desert
genie, aurochs, manticore, Mummy, roc; camel, ifrit; thalassic behemoth (leviathan), thunder behemoth, dybbuk, ghul, Jackalwere, maftet, nephilim, androsphinx, criosphinx, heiracosphinx, suli; almiraj, apocalypse locust, elohim, rukh, taniniver

Central/South Africa - Africa south of the Sahara, including the Congo and Serengeti
Ape (Gorilla), basilisk, Dire Ape, Cheetah, brontosaurus dinosaur (mokele mbembe), gnoll, hyena, dire hyena, lion, dire lion, elephant, rhinoceros, hippopotamus, behemoth hippopotamus, leucrotta, baboon, soul eater, Juju Zombie, grootslang, kongamato, lukwata, popobala, taotieh; giraffe, nependis, zombie lord,

India - the Indian Subcontinent
elephant, nagas, rakshasas, jyoti(?), leucrotta; asuras; bhuta, garuda, vanara, vishkanya; juggernaut, nagaji, yamaraj psychopomp, samsaran,

China/Mongolia/Korea - East Asian lands south of Russia
Dragon Turtle, tiger, dire tiger, yeti; death worm, dragon horse; Imperial dragons, foo creature, kirin, terra-cotta soldier, jiang-shi vampire, yaoguai,

Japan - The Japanese Archipelago and surrounding islands
Oni, giant slug, tengu; baku, Imperial Dragons, jorogumo, kami, kappa, kirin, nue, ratfolk, sagari, sea bonze (umibozu), shinigami, tanuki, jiang-shi, yukionna; aoandon, bakekujira, gaki, gashadokuro, harionago, hyakume, jinmenju, kaiju, kitsune, ningyo, pipefox (kuda-gitsune), rokurokubi,

Southeast Asia - Lands and island chains southeast of Chin and north west of Australia
Adaro, berbalang, giant gecko, manananggal, penanggalen, siyokoy skunk, giant skunk; Abaia, kapre, tikbalang, giant tortoise, wayang,

Australia - the Australia continent and surrounding islands
giant frilled lizard, bunyip, marsupials; julunggali,

North America/Greenland
bison, Grizzly Bear, wolverine, dire wolverine; chupacabra, gar, giant gar, mothman, thunderbird, wendigo; adlet, akhlut, baykok, tempest behemoth, hodag, great horned owl, pale stranger, puckwudgie, sasquatch, skunk, giant skunk, tupilaq, zuvembie; ijiraq, isitoq, manitou, qallupilluk, trumpeter swan, wikkawak,

Central/South America
Army Ant Swarm, Leopard, couatl, giant flytrap, poison frog, mummy; chupacabra, gar, giant gar, giant anaconda, xtabay; ahuizotl, skunk, giant skunk, tzitzimitl; chaneque, catrina psychopomp, sayona,

Universal (All Climates)
CRB: Human; Aasimar, Giant Ant, Dire Bat, Bat Swarm, Dire Bear, boar, dire boar, centipede, giant centipede, riding dog, dog, true dragon, eagle, giant eagle, elementals, giants, half-celestial, half-dragon, half-fiend, hell hound, horse, pony, invisible stalker, lycanthrope, phoenix, dire rat, rat swarm, shadow, greater shadow, constrictor snake, venomous snake, giant spider, spider swarm, tiefling, vampire, giant wasp, wasp swarm, will-o'-wisp; attic whisperer, giant bee, giant queen bee, goliath stag beetle, slicer beetle, giant whiptail centipede, titan centipede, giant cockroach, cockroach swarm, primal dragon, giant dragonfly, fetchling, giant fly, giant maggot, hellcat, ram, petitioner, poltergeist, ravener (dracolich), giant black widow spider, giant tarantula, giant tick, tick swarm; animal lord, broken soul creature, bogeyman, globster, hellwasp swarm, giant owl, snake swarm, venemous snake swarm, giant crab spider, ogre spider, vulture, giant vulture; divine guardian, outer dragons, empyreal lord, giant flea, mammoth flea, guardian dragon, stag, living topiary, giant locust, locust swarm, shadow creature, goliath spider, scarlet spider, immense tortoise, dire weasel, giant weasel, wyvaran,

Universal (Temperate/Arctic)
fire beetle, giant stag beetle, giant mantis, goblin, hobgoblin, treant, wolf, dire wolf; badger, dire badger, giant toad, antelope, elk, porcupine, giant porcupine.

Universal (Dry Desert)
giant scorpion, black scorpion, cave scorpion, black scorpion, cave scorpion, emperor cobra, deadfall scorpion, ghost scorpion, mummified creature, giant emperor scorpion, greensting scorpion,

Universal (Jungle/Wetlands)
crocodile, dire crocodile, giant frog, monitor lizard, giant mosquito, monkey swarm, mosquito swarm; catfolk, giant chameleon, mummified creature,

Universal (Aquatic)
giant crab, crab swarm, dolphin, orca, electric eel, giant moray eel, giant leech, leech swarm, merfolk, octopus, giant octopus, sea serpent, shark, dire shark, squid, giant squid; giant jellyfish, jellyfish swarm, manta ray, stingray, snapping turtle, giant snapping turtle, whale, great white whale; cecaelia, shark-eating crab, shipwrecker crab, death's head jellyfish, sapphire jellyfish, giant sea anemone, deep sea serpent, giant seahorse, killer seahorse, bull shark, great white shark, walrus, emperor walrus, giant water strider, nymph water strider,

Universal (Constructs)
Animated Object, golem, homunculus; scarecrow, soulbound doll; caryatid column, colossus, graven guardian, living wall, soulbound mannequin, soulbound shell, wyrwood.

Universal (Undead)
devourer, ghost, mohrg, specter, skeleton, skeletal champion, zombie; crawling hand, giant crawling hand, crypt thing, graveknight, winter hag; beheaded, ectoplasmic creature, festering spirit, gallowdead, geist, necrocraft, phantom armor, pickled punk, skinstitch, warsworn,

Subterranean Cryptids
Lizardfolk

Age of Dinosaurs
Dinosaurs, dire shark, troglodyte,

Prehistoric
mastodon, wooly rhinoceros, dire shark, dire wolf; megafauna; axe beak

Wonderland
Jabberwock, bandersnatch, jubjub bird,

Cthulhu Mythos
choker, ghoul, gibbering mouther, neothelid, shoggoth, skum; chaos beast, denizen of leng, gug, hound of tindalos, leng spider, mu spore, serpentfolk, seugathi, shantak, worm that walks, moon beast, voonith, yithian, zoog; bhole, colour out of space, demon lord dagon, flying polyp, Great Old Ones, immortal ichor, mi-go, nightgaunt, nightmare creature, spawn of yog-sothoth, star spawn of cthulhu

Planet Barsoom (Mars)
Girallon (Barsoomian White Gorilla); kasatha, shobhad, trox,

Planet Venus
Formians

Other Literary
Morlock, Peryton; carbuncle; bodythief,

D&D-Original
Aboleth, Ankheg, basidirond, bebelith, behir, black pudding, boggard, bulette, chuul, cloaker, dark creeper, dark stalker, darkmantle, drider, ettercap, froghemoth, gelatinous cube, girallon, goblin dog, grey ooze, nessian hell hound, intellect devourer, mephit, mimic, mite, ochre jelly, otyugh, owlbear, phase spider, pseudodragon, purple worm, remorhaz, retriever, roper, rust monster, sahuagin, shambling mound, shocker lizard, stirge, vargouille, vegepygmy, violet fungus, xill, xorn, yellow musk creeper; achaierai, akata, aranea, athach, aurumvorax, azer, belker, blindheim, blink dog, carnivorous blob, crysmal, dark slayer, destrachan, forlarren, frost giant, gloomwing, gray render, grick, grig, grippli, gryph, hangman tree, Inevitables, korred, krenshar, locathah, magma ooze, mercane, mongrelman, necrophidius, neh-thalggu, quickling, quickwood, phycomid, skulk, slithering tracker, giant solifugid, albino cave solifugid, tendriculos, tenebrous worm, tentamort, thoqqua, viper vine, winterwight, yrthak; adherer, allip, ascomoid, demilich, demodand, dire corby, disenchanter, dragonne, flail snail, flumph, guecubu, huecuva, kamadan, kech, magmin, rot grub swarm, giant rot grub, phantom fungus, black mastiff, spider eater, thriae, tojanida, wolf-in-sheep's-clothing; dark caller, dark dancer, death dog, lurking ray,

Golarion-original
Kyton; agathion, giant amoeba, amoeba swarm, animate dream, axiomite, mobat, skaveling, charda, decapus, d'ziriak, fungal crawler, howler, lurker in light, Mishtu, moonflower, rast, reefclaw, sard, sceaduinar, shining child, sinspawn, slime mold, slurk, thrasfyr, totenmaske, twigjack, urdefhan, vampiric mist, vemerak, witchfire, witchwyrd, xacarba; azruverda, baregara, brain ooze, carnivorous crystal, caulborn, ceratioidi, cerebric fungus, cold rider, deathtrap ooze, deathweb, derhii, dust digger, faceless stalker, festrog, garden ooze, ghorazagh, goblin snake, grodair, hollow serpent, hungry fog, mobogo, myceloid, proteans, plasma ooze, sargassum fiend, shae; astral leviathan, bloodborn, brethedan, comozant wyrd, contemplative, dorvae, fleshdreg, fleshwarp, freezing flow, fungal creature, galvo, gholdako, hungry flesh, incutilis, leaf ray, lunarma, mindslaver mold, mudlord, nightshade, nycar, oma, owb, saguaroi, seaweed siren, shard slag, shredskin, shriezyx, soulsliver, tunche, tyrant jelly, weedwhip, xenopterid, zomok

So, I've had this design for, like, ever.

It's one of my more favorite for just how absolutely ridiculous it is. The character is a dual-pistol wielding superspy who specializes in disguises and covert operations... and pulling off crazy John-Woo-esque fight scenes. And had ludicrous amounts of Grit and Panache.

Also uses Gunkata starting at level 11, using pistols to deflect melee attacks and parry back. Because why the hell not?

The Build requires 5 classes - lv4 Daring Infiltrator Swashbuckler, lv2 Mysterious Stranger Gunslinger, lv2 Skirmisher Guide Urban Ranger, lv2 Weapon Master Fighter, lv2 Cleaner Slayer.

Race Rapid Reload (Pistol)
CL1 Myst1 Quick Draw, Gunsmithing | Focused Aim, Deadeye, Gunslinger's Dodge
CL2 Rng1 Track | Ranger's Focus +1
CL3 Rng2 Weapon Focus (Pistol), Precise Shot
CL4 WpMs1 Dazzling Display
CL5 WpMs2 Two-Weapon Fighting, Gun Twirling | Weapon Guard
CL6 Clnr1 Deceitful | Studied Target
CL7 Clnr2 Point-Blank Shot, Rapid Shot
CL8 DrIn1 Swashbuckler's Finesse, Opportune Parry & Riposte, Dodging Panache, Derring-Do
CL9 DrIn2 Weapon Specialization, Persuasive | Quick-Tongued +1
CL10 DrIn3 Kip-Up, Clandestine Expertise, Silence is Golden, Precise Strike
CL11 DrIn4 Point Blank Master, Snap-Shot
CL12 Myst2 Lucky+1

Okay, so, bear with me a moment, 'cause this is kinda hilarious.

You're a Human. Or a Half-Elf, Half-Orc, or Scion Of Humanity Aasimar.

You therefore qualify to take the feat, Racial Heritage.

Good so far.

You choose Kobold, because Kobold is a Humanoid racial type.

Odd, but legal.

You decided to take Tail Terror.

Wait, wut.

See, Tail Terror's Requirements are:

Prerequisites: Base attack bonus +1, kobold.

Notice the distinct lack of "Tail" in the requirements.

So, since you PROBABLY don't have a tail as a human or half-human, would you guys call this kosher? Like, would you just allow the player that walks up to you with this to use their leg in a tail-like manner, or maybe get Clockwork Prosthetic Tail, or what?

I just think it's absolutely hilarious that the requirements for Tail Terror don't include the requirement of you, y'know... HAVING A TAIL.

Examples of medieval-style archery

This archer here has studied medieval and ancient styles of archery, which include holding your payload in one of your hands (either the bow or draw hand), placing the arrow on the right side of the bow, rather than left, and it's success at firing rapid shots with fairly high accuracy.

This lends a LOT of credence to the idea of being able to fire 4+ arrows in 6 seconds (1 round) at level 20, since he's shown to fire 4 arrows in 4 seconds while moving.

The default assumption for Half-Elves and Half-Orcs is that the other half is Human. However, it's stated that the other half can be anything, really; the downside being, of course, that you lose all the fun bits that come with having Human blood (which is a very long list of awesome stuff).

But, now here's a fun rules snarl - if you are 1/2 Elf and 1/2 Orc, are you a Half-Elf, a Half-Orc, or both? Can you also, therefore, choose the Favored Class Bonuses of a Half-Elf, Half-Orc, Elf, or Orc for classes?

This seems like some serious rulemongering gnarliness (and potentially really nasty, as a primarily-Half-Elf could have TWO Favored Classes and choose from up to 4 different FCAs per class).

Has anybody seen/tried this?

I'd like to run a war, but I'm not a huge fan of the PCs effectively disappearing while a single player conducts the war, or they stop being PCs and just start controlling armies.

I like the general design of the Mass Combat rules in Ultimate Campaign, and there is a small section concerning PCs in a battle, but it doesn't go into great detail about it.

Anyway, what I want to do is basically use the normal Mass Combat rules and have the PCs go running around the battlefield accomplishing tasks and fighting knee-deep in the war, Romance of the Three Kingdoms / Dynasty Warriors style. Basically, the PCs would be lieutenants, captains, or even generals of the army, but be directly involved with the fighting.

As it stands, what I'm thinking right now is that I'd segment off conflicts within the battle into key locations or Areas (since real warfare is rarely just two gigantic armies smacking into one another).

Whenever PCs enter an Area, they begin a Combat as normal - roll for Init, all that. The PCs then have complete control over their individual actions and the fight is just one giant melee with lots and lots of mooks.

Combat taking place in Areas that Party isn't currently in aren't in would operate on the Mass Combat Phase rules, as an abstraction of the battle happening where they don't have personal control of the situation.

The Ranged Phase would take a single Round when appropriate, and each Melee Phase would occur once every 10 Rounds, to create a time table of events.

PCs entering areas where the Melee Phase has already occurred will encounter troops who've already taken damage, thus the numbers on both sides of the conflict would have individuals removed appropriately.

So, that's the basic outline of the design - what I'm wondering now is, is this a decent way of dealing with the PC-level and Army-level encounters, and is the timeline too small (should the Melee Phase be spread further apart than just 10 Rounds)?

Also, what kinds of boons, bonuses, etc. should be incorporated into it, and how do you think events should be handled with in (such as destroying a bridge, opening a rampart, transporting an official, etc.)?