glandis's page

(snipped for brevity)

I like this approach quite a bit. All that is missing from the standard rules is a broken-not-destroyed shield, and you could add that by saying it happens at 1 Structure or <50% Structure.

Once, yes.

Without that struck out sentence, the Delay rules don't tell you that you have to return to Initiative. You suffer the effects once when you declare you Delay. You are taken out of initiative. You can reenter after any other creature's turn, but you wouldn't have to.

We're getting a bit circular here, but - maybe the Delay rules tell you you CAN'T Delay into the next turn, and they ALSO tell you you DO have to resume your previous initiative next turn. Meaning if you choose to Delay again, that "Once" kicks in again. An elegant prevention of allowing Delay to avoid/persist undesirable/desired effects. That's among the reasons I think the crossed-out sentence does mean "no Delay past last-to-act" - it works quite cleanly and well. Sliding to higher-initiative in the next turn just gets ugly, as others have pointed out above, and isn't (for me) of important utility anyway.

But like I said, we're getting circular, so unless someone has a really different angle on this, there's probably not much more to say.

I'm of the mind that Reactions have to witness the action in-game that triggers them, means that action occurs. Many class abilities & feats give Reactions that can predict/interrupt/retroactively occur, but that's what makes them special.

Great point - there ARE reactions that have more rules-driven triggers, but the customized by a player via Ready triggers are specified as needing that "observable by a character" quality. At least, that's how I'm seeing it right now.

Rules wise would the creature be "bound" to move to a certain square with Stride or would he be allowed to follow the retreating PC?

I wouldn't see the creature as bound to stop moving - if it has additional movement, that movement is still available. No way for the "target" to even know if an attack was planned based on the movement that triggers their reaction. Maybe the moving creature was just passing by on the way to get close to and hit someone else.

At least, that's my read on it.

This is telling you, that you can't skip past your original Initiative position in the next round, thus avoiding any negative effects forever

Maybe. Except that the Delay rules already handle triggering effects as soon as you Delay. But if so, it ought to say "If you Delay YOUR entire round" rather than "an entire round." Of course, if you can't Delay past the last-to-act, it ought to say something like "If you Delay to the last position this round". Or just add "note that you can't Delay past the last position in this round - you must re-enter initiative then or before, otherwise you return to your original position next round."

Feels to me like "a round" is clearly specified as "ends when the one with the lowest initiative ends their turn", and that's gotta matter. But I wouldn't be shocked to learn that instead, IT is the bit that's imprecise, and should have a note like "this doesn't prevent Delaying past then, acting at the end of any other creature’s turn all the way up to your original initiative - and NOT beyond."

(BTW, there's something familiar about this issue/discussion. Seems like long ago someone identified that using "round" (or "turn", for that matter) both as a by-individual duration measure and as a noun describing one cycle of actions for a foe-ally group was a mistake. But so far, no good alternatives seem to have shown up.)

For me, looking at the play effects ... what happens if you can't Delay this round to a higher initiative in the next? The only practical annoyance I see is that it means you can't reposition yourself to right after (or before, by going after the previous creature) someone (an ally especially) who has a higher initiative. But with an ally, THEY could Delay to right before or after you. With a foe ... I guess I'm fine with the initiative order just being inconvenient for the character on occasion. We (well, I for certain) don't play expecting such things to always line-up as, or be manipulable to, our tactical ideal.

"Notably,the trigger must be something that happens in the game world and is observable by the character rather than a rules concept that doesn’t exist in world."

Totally reasonable that opinions may vary here, and I have no position on the power-balance of the OP's interpretation, but to me ... if your character is observing the actual attack, it's too late to keep it from resolving (can't know if it's REALLY an attack until it hits or misses, right?) So yeah, the best you could get for your trigger would be "threat moves close to me", which means they haven't yet used a Strike (or etc.) Now, the tactic still might work that round - if they come after you, you move farther than they can follow and Strike, and there's no one else around for them to Strike at ... that could still make them "lose" an opportunity. But not always, and they would still have that action for SOMEthing (maybe a Stride next to you with a murderous gleam in their three eyes?)

"If you Delay an entire round without returning to the initiative order, the actions from the Delayed turn are lost, your initiative doesn’t change, and your next turn occurs at your original position in the initiative order." This part (nothing new - others also quoted it) is why I assume 2e won't let you delay past the end of the round (as defined in the also already-quoted "A round [...] ends when the one with the lowest initiative ends their turn." The "your next turn occurs at your ORIGINAL position" seems unneeded if already Delaying all the way to your original position was possible. You'd already BE there, why would the rule need to tell you when your next turn occurs?

I'm more used to the other way of looking at it, and I'm not sure if I like losing the ability to Delay into a higher initiative (between 2nd best and whatever my old one was), or the game-mechanic intrusiveness of "end of the round" defined this way, but ... the part I quoted above really seems to make most sense with a "can't Delay past the bottom-most initiative after you" assumption. And it IS simpler in many ways.

Since I'm trying to play 2e as "it's DIFFERENT - play it DIFFERENT, not the same as you've been doing in 3.5/1e for forever", I'll be recommending no Delay past the last initiative to our GM (not that it comes up all that often).

The description of the Terrifying Croak Racial Trait seems to be missing some important info.

Am I missing something? Seeing as it seems to be built from the Boggard ability, which says "within 30 feet", that's what I'd assume it should be. But ... FAQ/Erratta required?

If you're allowed 3rd party FEATS, there's this: http://www.d20pfsrd.com/feats/3rd-party-feats/kobold-press/general-feats--- 3rd-party---kobold-press/two-wand-technique

I think it's too good, but ...

Somehow, I find this appropriate here:

The programmer’s wife tells him: “Run to the store and pick up a loaf of bread. If they have eggs, get a dozen.”

The programmer comes home with 12 loaves of bread.

A standard action to get a bonus on a saving throw is pretty weird. The cases where you could even do that are vanishingly rare. It seems likely that they screwed up and it ought to state an exception to the "Su = standard" rule and be a free/immediate action.

But given what it says ... standard action. Of course, I'd house-rule otherwise at the drop of a hat.

I would never let this work as the OP describes. Among the reasons I might use is "Feather fall works only upon free-falling objects." I'd rule that rocks you're attacking with(1) are not free-falling objects. Not to mention that, since you're attacking with them, you need to roll (easy) attacks and use your (limited) supply of actions. Even free actions have the "GM can limit" language.

But there's some interesting inventiveness in the OP, so ... I might rule (complete GM rule-creation) that if you can get a good "scatter" of objects, you could blanket a larger area with 5d6 (or whatever you can Empower/etc.) blasts. No single 5' square could generate more than 1 blast, though.

So someone comes up with this idea when they're falling a short distance - "OK, make an attack roll to hit the square next to where you land with a stone. As long as you don't screw up, there'll be a blast there too." Longer distance, maybe more stones. Multiple people, maybe each gets a stone. I do want to reward creativity, but not with fun-and-credibility-straining (for me) thousands of points of damage.

(1) I'm a firm believer that the effect of a game-action is what determines which rules should apply, not some doomed-to-fail attempt at seeing the rules as realistically mirroring some gameworld "physics". The rules are abstractions - dropping rocks with an intent to damage is different than just dropping rocks as colorful description. One is an attack, and needs to follow attack rules. The other isn't, and doesn't - no matter that the "actual" (ha! - imaginarily actual) action is the same in both cases.

I hope it's not rude to point out that the FAQ does not say what the post says. Saying "may select [lots of stuff] and so on" and "as if they were a full member of both races" is very clear. Answering "yes" to "[can select] human racial favored class bonus" and "[can] select human racial archetypes" is not equivalent.

Heavy armor reduces your speed by 10' (actually, by various amounts depending on your base speed)due to being heavy armor. Encumbrance is just weight, which the armor might contribute to, but - you don't reduce armor move penalties with Lame until 10th level, when Lame says :

"At 10th level, your speed is never reduced by armor."

This is almost certainly a typo/errata issue, but I couldn't find any reference to it. Liberty's Blessing reads "you can use this ability for a number of times equal to 3 + your Wisdom modifier." So, like - ever? Something around 5-9 times in the life of the character? It's a pretty cool power, and 5-9 times a day would be a lot, but a lifetime cap? Surely not!

Since they are not actually enlarged there is no stacking problem with an actual Enlarge effect.

Well, no problem with spikes, sure - but Bashing MIGHT have a problem due to the multiple magic effects rule. And with each other (Bashing & spikes) - there's been developer comment that they shouldn't stack, and my reword of the spike description was meant to make that clear. Without some clarification, it'll remain debatable.

And a look at Giants ... reveals examples of the problems discussed above.

A Cloud Giant wields a Gargantuan Morningstar, a Storm Giant a Huge greatsword, both at 4d6. 4d6 does not appear anywhere on the "Tiny and Large Weapon Damage" table. It only appears in the "Natural Attacks by Size" table as a step-up from 2d8. But a step-up from 2d8 on the "Tiny and Large Weapon Damage" table is 3d8, not 4d6. Now, there's no inherent problem with Natural Attacks scaling differently than Weapons, but some sort of recognizable, text-supported (as opposed to often-reasonable extrapolation) solution would be nice.

Fire Giant (greatsword) and Frost Giant (greataxe) make SENSE per the "Tiny and Large Weapon Damage" table (both do 3d6), but to have both 2d6 and d12 scale to the same 3d6 means that making a greatsword (or the Hill and Stone greatclub) Large is "worse" than making a greataxe Large.

What size increases?

The "as if the shield were designed for a creature one size category larger" (spikes) and "as if it were a weapon of two size categories larger" (bashing).

And your polymorph comment and Murphys "as if" seem to be in conflict. Or maybe not - thus, FAQ. I'm personally inclined not to quibble with the details of "as if" vs. actually increasing size, and instead look at the overall effect. Are there multiple magic effects required to generate the result? Then they don't stack. But that kind of effects-based thinking isn't always what the game wants us to do - thus (again), FAQ.

EDIT to close quote

So what rules exist about this? There's the stuff above - the two tables, the Bashing shield, and Shillelagh spell. Shillelagh actually makes it clear that 2d6 scales to 3d6, so - probably throw out the Natural Weapons table when it comes to actual weapons. Scaling 2d6 to 2d8 is "smoother" than 3d6, but - we seem to know that's not how it works. The shortage of specific references for Huge weapons is odd, though. And given the variance in current scaling from S to M to L, GMs might well decide on different damage dice from the "same" starting point. Say, a H Longsword is 2d6 but a H Falcata is d12. After all, they're not REALLY the same - different crit, exotic v. martial, etc. Those things were (presumably) taken into account in the S/M/L damage, so extending variance into H and beyond isn't fundamentally different. It's annoying, because now every weapon needs judgment calls at every size, but - again, that's presumably what happened at S/M/L.

Several places (Enlarge Person spell, e.g.) say "Multiple magical effects that increase size do not stack." That can be pretty strait-forward - e.g, I guess you get no benefit from Lead Blading a Bashing shield. But - sometimes the scope is unclear. Is it meant to cover the overall outcome of magical effects, or only localized instances? That is, the overall outcome of Lead Blades and Enlarge Person is that multiple magic effects increase the effective size of a weapon. So with an outcome-focus, they don't stack. But if we localize the Enlarge to the person and the Lead Blades to the weapon - then it's one effect "per thing", so a form of stacking can happen. As it stands, I see it as a total GM call as to which to pick.

Now, shields. Shield spikes are currently described thus:

Shield Spikes: These spikes turn a shield into a martial piercing weapon and increase the damage dealt by a shield bash as if the shield were designed for a creature one size category larger than you (see “spiked shields” on Table: Weapons). You can't put spikes on a buckler or a tower shield. Otherwise, attacking with a spiked shield is like making a shield bash attack.

An enhancement bonus on a spiked shield does not improve the effectiveness of a shield bash made with it, but a spiked shield can be made into a magic weapon in its own right.

Here's what I think it should say, to remove any concerns with size stacking w/ Bashing. Of course, if size stacking is what's desired - I was never here (smile):

Shield Spikes: These spikes [instead of "turn a shield into"] are a martial piercing weapon that [instead of "increase the damage dealt by a shield bash"] does damage as per a shield bash from a shield designed for a creature one size category larger than you (see “spiked shields” on Table: Weapons). You can't put spikes on a buckler or a tower shield. Otherwise, attacking with [instead of "a spiked shield"] shield spikes is like making a shield bash attack.

[Instead of paragraph 2]Shield spikes can be a magic weapon in their own right, but any spike enhancement bonus does not improve a normal (non-spike) shield bash made with that shield. Likewise, enhancements on the shield do not affect the spikes.

OK, that's enough. Hope someone finds it useful/amusing, and FAQ away at the first post!

So, my bias: I like having "big weapon" options exist in the game. Even "really big" weapons, though I'd draw the line at some (not currently defined) number of "really"s.

But I HATE the current scaling mechanics. (NOTE: the following analysis is by no means complete, but I think it includes enough to show what I don't like). No matter whether you try and extrapolate sizing from the "Tiny and Large Weapon Damage" table (which would seem to indicate that 2d6 jumps to 3d6) or use the "Natural Attacks by Size" table (which clearly shows 2d6 is followed by 2d8), you've got problems. A Small weapon that does 1d8 becomes 1d10 at Medium, but a Medium weapon that does 1d8 becomes 2d6 at Large. A 1d6 S Warhammer goes to 1d8 at M, but a 1d6 S Falchion goes to M 2d4. A S Earthbreaker goes from 1d10 to 2d6 at M, but a M Greatsword goes from 1d10 to 2d8 at L. I hate this - what it really means (for me) is that "extrapolation" actually isn't possible, and a general rule about any weapon larger than L does not really exist. Any huge/bigger weapon you've ever seen/used is a unique thing (examples from the text that directly state size H (M + 2) and specific dice are the Bashing property and Shillelagh spell).

But many threads discussing this issue go ahead and try and extrapolate generally anyway. And my, do you get odd behavior/breakpoints. Examples:

Dagger, d6 L to H = d8, 1 pt improvement.
Light Mace, d8 L to H = 2d6, 2.5 pt improvement.
Large weapon at d10 - as far as I can tell, this can't exist. Huh?
Scythe 2d6 L to H = 3d6 or 2d8 (Weapons v. Natural Weapons table), 3.5 or 2 pt improvement.
Greatsword 2d8 L to H = 3d8 or 4d6 (Weapons v. Natural Weapons table), 4.5 or 5 pt improvement.

So sometimes the Natural Weapons table would be better, sometimes extrapolating the regular Weapons would be. The details of where you started and what progression you use can exaggerate the advantage of some weapons over others, which with the multiplying-effect of iterative attacks, extras from haste/flurry/ki/etc., and crit multipliers, can become GREATLY exaggerated. I don't like that. And (most relevantly to this post) it means the answers to the questions can make a big difference

I've read lots of threads discussing issues around size increases, and while there is much (often good) discussion, including some comments from designers, I haven't been able to find any definitive FAQlike answers (feel free to point me at 'em if they exist). So for ease of FAQability, let me ask 3 questions:

1) Shields with the magic "Bashing" enhancement and shield spikes: do these size increases stack?

2) If a character under the effects of "Enlarge Person" has another way to increase/effectively increase the size of their weapon (e.g., Lead Blades spell, Bashing shield), do some and/or all of those effects stack?

3) Where do we look to find the amount of damage done by Huge or larger weapons?

I think answers to those questions (and whatever nuances the designers would care to comment on) would clear up a lot of issues. I could see all answered in many ways. I do have thoughts/opinions, naturally, and I'll post 'em below, and of course anyone can chime in. But I'm hoping clearly leaving the above as core questions not universally/definitively answered will help get FAQclicks and/or designer comment.

Well, it won't help with the power level (especially starting at level 6), but the Rough and Ready trait seems perfect for this idea.

Dimensional Agility - yeah, looks like that does it. Mythic deeds ensue!

Her ability to cast dimension door, grab a party member (or a powerful artifact), then cast dimension door again as a swift action (via wild magic) proved to be absolutely invaluable during our play test.

Sounds fun, but "A creature that passes through the portal [Dimension Door] can’t take any other actions until its next turn" probably means it technically shouldn't work.

Where this becomes interesting (to me) is if you initiate the charge but something (getting tripped by an AoO on your way, for e.g.) keeps you from actually making the attack. Do you really need to take the AC penalty when you didn't even get to attack? I'm inclined to say yes, but also could understand the "penalty starts after attack" logic to avoid any endless circle of "if you're hit by a trip, your AC is 2 better 'cause you never got to actually charge, but if that means you'd be missed, you can finish the charge and attack, so your AC is 2 less, which means you ARE hit, but since that'd mean you're not charging, you're missed, except ...".

So: -2 AC only staring AFTER the attack is a bit weird, but perhaps simpler when dealing with an interrupted charge. I don't play it that way, but wouldn't freak out too much if someone did.

Lame Oracle of Metal is another interesting way to do this - without the Rage, of course. VERY classic, though - lame smith.

I don't think even the human (Halfling, in this case) Racial Heritage feat would technically let you do that. There ought to be a way, but I don't know how.

The class skills gained by a bloodline are usually specific - a particular skill or a particular type of Knowledge. With the Arcane default, it's Knowledge(any one), so you have the flexibility to pick. But it's still a particular Knowledge.

Maestro, on the other hand, simply gives you Perform. I figure this ought to be Perform(pick one).

Without this, I guess Eldritch Heritage is technically impossible to take with the Maestro bloodline, as there is no Skill Focus: Perform(all), only Skill Focus: Perform(some specific form). Hero Lab has this problem, BTW - it apparently looks for Skill Focus: Perform(all), and does not recognize (e.g.) Skill Focus: Perform(oratory) as meeting the Eldritch Heritage prereq.

Thoughts?

I think this falls more under the general "you can't heal the nonlethal damage until you stop taking it" thing like for heat exhaustion or hunger.

Well, those are specific cases rather than the general rule, but yes, good point: heat/cold/etc. have "cannot be recovered until xxx" statements that make them pretty clear.

So I guess overland Hustle and Forced March need that kind of a statement too. "Nonlethal damage from Hustle/Forced March cannot be recovered while the character continues to Hustle/Forced March?"

Continuing the overthinking, the consequences of this are fairly big for a most-of-the-day Hustle - Hhour (hustle hour) 1 is already free, Hhour 2 does only 1 nonlethal, hour 3 at a normal pace recovers it, Hhour 4 does 2 nonlethal, hour 5 at a normal pace recovers it for a lvl 2 character, Hhour 6 does 4 nonlethal, hour 7 at a normal pace recovers it for a lvl 4 character, Hhour 8 does 8 nonlethal - and the normal travel day is done, with 8 nonlethal to heal (2 hours at lvl 4, 1 at lvl 8).

So that means a lvl 8 character can hustle for 5 out of the 8 travel hours in a day with little consequence. For a 30' speed character, that's 39 miles/day, instead of 24.

OK, I'm gonna go ahead and overthink this:

1 hour = 1 hour seems questionable, given the context of the rules for a prolonged Hustle or Forced March. There, you take non-lethal damage per hour past 1 hustle/past 8 forced march. In the hustle case, if 1 hour = 1 hour, then it will take quite a bit longer before you even notice. Lvl 1 get you an extra hour of free hustle, lvl 2 2 hours, lvl 4 3hrs, lvl 8 4 hrs, lvl 16 6 hrs. Forced march is even worse - even if you start failing the Con checks, 1d6 non-lethal is obviously totally irrelevant by lvl 6.

New version of the question: is that rest like the rest to recover from running ("During a rest period, a character can move no faster than a normal move action"), or the uninterrupted 8 hours needed to heal normal damage?

I'm actually really surprised at how unclear the wording of this is ...

So, the rule says "You heal nonlethal damage at the rate of 1 hit point per hour per character level." But - per hour of what? Just elapsed time? Time spent resting? Sleeping?

If you're walking for an hour, do you heal your level in nonlethal? What about if you're hustling? What about if you're riding?

My temptation is to say that any strenuous activity (in combat, hustling/running, riding at a run/hustle, doing anything while fatigued, etc.) prevents nonlethal recovery, but something like normal speed riding/walking ... sure, you recover nonlethal then.

But there may be wiser minds out there! Thoughts?

If someone has a RAW quote for how this save is handled, that would be lovely, otherwise I will take interpretations because I can't find this on the forums or anywhere in the rule books.

I'd go with case 1 but add more info. Since it replaces dirge of doom, I'd say this applies: "The effect persists for as long as the enemy is within 30 feet and the bard continues the performance." Now, note that it says they BECOME flat-footed, not that they STAY flat-footed, so - normal "lose flat-footed after I'm attacked/when I get an inititiative action" process still happens. Re-flat-footing would only happen with a new performance.

There might be odd cases where we're not in an initiative situation, a target failed the save but changing circumstances (someone calling out 'Hey, anyone see what happened to Janey? She dissapeared!) dictate a new save. In general, though, I read this as a "lower their guard for one shot" ability.

EDIT - I guess if the target or bard moved so that they weren't in 30' , and then were in 30' on a subsequent turn, the target would have to save again.

Elamdri wrote:

Lame Curse Reduces your base speed by 10. Some Mysteries, like Flame and Metal, have revelations that increase your base speed by 10. Curse Negated.

and they specifically state "cannot be taken if you have the lame curse"

Flame/Cinder Dance says this. Metal/Dance of the Blades does not.

Tumbling was the 3.x skill used primarily as Acrobatics is to "Move Through Threatened Squares" here ..

Dragging is covered under the "Lifting and Dragging" section here.

EDIT: Sure enough, Ninja's are Villans - or is that Villan's are Ninja's?

Since the Stabbing Shot replaces the extra attack from Rapid Shot, I'd say it obviously gets rid of the -2 from Rapid Shot as well. Nonproficiency .. . looks like they missed covering that, probably Stabbing Shot should say "... melee attack against that opponent with a drawn arrow as if you were firing it" or something like that. *I* would leave the penalty at -2 (it does say "all ... take a -2 penalty", they could have added the -4 nonproficency there), but if someone insisted the melee attack should be at -6, I guess they have an argument.

In 3.5, reach and non-reach tactics were importantly different, and interesting choices could be made on that basis. The spiked chain totally broke the reach rules - every other weapon, as their basic state, you could attack next to yourself or a square away.

A "I break the rules" ability AND excellent stats was (IMO, and most others I played 3.5 with) too much for the spiked chain.

All weapons mentioned (heavy flail, longspear) can NOT, as base weapon abilities, do what the whip can - attack throughout an extended reach.

PF seems to have gone with "you can break the reach rules and attack throughout a great range (15'), but your stats will suffer." That seems like a good choice to me. Other options might've worked, the degree of stat-reduction could be agrued, but overall - they fixed an actual issue.

At least, that's what I'd say.

So - dead shot only works with firearms, so we can erase all those, making things a little simpler. Do you still want this calculated out?

No, you cannot. Though note that it's a Free Action, not a Swift to maintain the luck. It's only a Swift to start it. Lingering Performance is still eminently worthwhile, though.

Yeah, so you start your Luck with a Swift, and DON'T maintain it - Lingering Performance keeps it around for 2 more rounds, and you've only burned 1 of your (4 + cha) pool. Round 4, if you want to keep it up, you need to spend that Swift action again (and repeat the above as needed), so the only problem would be if there was a good chance you'd want that round 4 Swift action for something else. Round 2 & 3 Swift actions are totally available.

Level + Charisma per day does make a lot more sense, but I guess at the moment that's not "official."

Don't miss that "Archaeologist’s luck is treated as bardic performance for the purposes of feats, abilities, effects, and the like that affect bardic performance." Lingering Performance can add a lot of rounds to your luck each day - triple, in fact, unless you've got something else to spend your swift action on.

If you look here it says that spell resistance 19 costs what the +5 bonus costs.

No, it says that SR 19 adds +5 bonus to the cost. So if you had +1 Armor, you now have to pay for a +6 bonus. That'd be [36,000 (+6 base price) - 1,000 (+1 Armor)] a 35,000 increase in the armor cost.

So in your +1 Leaf Armor of Fire Resistance example, it was costed at 1,000 (+1) + 18,000 (flat cost for resistance) = 19,000.

New cost is +6 base cost(+5 for SR 19, +1 for +1 enhancement bonus) of 36,000 + flat cost of 18,000 (for resist) = 54,000.

54,000 - 19,000 = 35,000 to add the SR. ("wild" is an add +3 ability, which is why the cost was higher).

All the above ignores the base masterwork armor cost (which would be 650, for the leaf armor), as it doesn't change.

Yes, this is a better deal than a Mantle of SR 19 at 70,000. But if your armor was +5, you'd end up paying 75,000 extra for your SR 19. The balance isn't perfect, GMs may adjust costs as they see flaws in the system.

I'm also unclear why armor seems to be an exception to the "50% extra" cost, as it is a specific body location, but with the "add bonus" escalation there wouldn't really be a way to do it . . .

Now, if it were already +1 Leaf Armor of SR 19, and you added the Fire Resistance, it might be that the 50% cost would kick in and you'd pay an extra 27,000 (18Kx1.5).

These formulas aren't perfect, obviously! In the end, it'll be up to your GM.

EDIT - Actually, I'll bet the "50% extra" is already built in to the flat costs on the armor abilities, as they would ALWAYS be an addition to an item taking a specific body slot. So disregard that. The Mantle is priced about right to stack on top of high-plus armor (which is something a chest-slot item could do), but it is interesting that you can get SR a LOT cheaper on low-plus armor.

Dotting. Numeric bonus magic items as "normal" is both boring and annoying to me, so I want to have this marked to mine for alternate ideas.

How far ahead in your opinion should a the fighter be ahead of other classes since that is his main thing for your group?

Good question - maybe after all this I'll have a better numeric-sense, but for now I'd just say "if it's so bad people actually choose not to play a monk (who does, after all, have access -easier, at least - to things a fighter doesn't) becasue of it, then it's too much. Lower the disparity until people do start playing monks."

One way to lower that disparity is to disallow uber-effective fighter builds. That's what tends to happen IME, but that doesn't mean it's the only or best answer. Our reason for that in the past was to keep a wide variety of fighter-types viable, but I guess monk plugs in as well.

The comment "I'd like to do sword and hand-axe, but it's just not good enough" is a sure sign - to us- that there is a problem. If a monk couldn't be at least reasonably competitive (considering the other advantages they get) with an unarmed fighter, that'd be a problem.

Of course, it's also a problem if the flavor and style variation don't come across in play, which is why I started this with the possibility that the TWF-flurry connection wasn't all bad.

The monk is not meant to be a DPR machine, and DPR is a fighter's main thing so I would expect for him to come out ahead.

Oh yeah, I agree with that - the disparity just seems a bit TOO big. Having Weapon Training stay as is makes sense - it's really just the gloves I'd worry about.

But rules-tinkering is always a tricky thing.

Did you remember to compute that the unarmed fighter can use Brass Knuckles without losing out on damage while the monk cannot?

No - since this isn't even really what I was testing, I kept the Unarmed Fighter using Unarmed Strike, period. No spiked gauntlets, brass knuckles, cestus - none of it. That he's still competitive fairly early and eventualy starts to outpace the monk is impressive, given how my parameters hampered him.

Actually, my VERY provisional opinion from this part of the analysis is that what needs nerfing is the multiple-synergies of Weapon Specialization, Focus, and Training. I'm tempted to try out having "off-hand" be a different type of weapon for purposes of Focus & Specialization (Training would just not make sense, so it stays - unfortunate, given Dueling Gloves, but I guess I could not allow/nerf those). So you need two Feats for the full benefit of dual-wield Kukri. E.g., Weapon Focus (kukri) & Weapon Focus (kukri, off-hand). Maybe the same with Improved Critical. And then since the Monk is not considered off-hand (well, by one way of reading) they get a TINY edge from their (non-Greater) Weapon Focus/Improved Crit.

Of course, that would put TWF even further behind THW, which isn't good. Maybe some insights on that will come up as I look at the numbers of a glaive-fighter vs. glaive-(sohei? I guess) old-flurry vs. glaive- sohei my-flurry.

Maybe it's easier to stay with the "just don't uber-optimize" principle that most groups I've played with use. Still, I'd like to see a little more equity overall here. The (really unaccaeptable to me) idea that someone would just not do, e.g., the sword & hand-axe of Fafhrd or sword & dagger of the Grey Mouser just because they're SO far behind the power curve is solvable by not allowing uber-optimization, but since I do believe that mechanics WILL influence player behaviour (contrary to what some seem to think, I've certainly seen it happen lots, within and across game systems) . . . an in-system improvement would be nice.

Some conclusions

Well, I tricked myself into running numbers for Unarmed Strike Fighter vs. Standard Flurry Monk (which really has nothing to do with any change to FoB), and discovered a few interesting things (which most people here probably already knew).

1) 12th *is* a particularly bad lvl for the monk - at 11 & 12, the fighter has picked up the Two Weapon Rend, Greater Weapon Specialization, and/or Greater TWF (he'd have to have forgone taking a feat at 9 or 10 to have all three). I doubt it gets better for the monk at higher levels, but maybe?
2) Even with that, I don't find the disparity totally untenable, but it is noticeable. 15-20 DPR to the fighter, and the monk max potential is (at best) only a dozen points higher (still impressive, given that he has one fewer attack).
3) 10th is much closer, with a real max damage potential advantage to the monk. But the Unarmed Strike TWF fighter has nothing to be embarrased about.
4) I'm actually surprised at how few numeric +'s a monk can get from anywhere - he just doesn't qualify for many feats to help him out. So the pure unarmed flurry monk best include some non-DPR-focused abilities if he wants to shine.

Still, that is NOT what I was looking at in this thread - I was (supposedly) looking at the changes to FoB and how "mixing" unarmed strike might work. So the actual numbers I should check are a (say) glaive-wielding monk under "oh yes you can" flurry vs. "you must mix unarmed" flurry vs. (maybe) a fighter (just to see - I'm sure a THW fighter will kick some serious butt). Then I'll be able to let this go and just wait and see what the devs decide.

Then why are you all comparing the monk class to the fighter and no other?

Probably my fault. I frequently saw the claim (in other threads) that a half weapon/half unarmed strike monk would be outrageously weak compared to even a TWF fighter doing the same thing. My gut said "that don't sound likely." So I did a rough compare at 8th lvl of a monk vs a weapon & Unarmed Strike TWF fighter - the monk won. I changed the TWF to Longsword/Shortsword - the fighter caught up.

But when folks here think TWF fighter, they apparently think "dual-wield kukri-focused dealer of death." That looks pretty dominant. But it looks dominant over TONS of TWF fighter options, so I'm not sure where that leaves me. Getting an apples-apples compare is hard, because what everyone calls an apple varries widely.

Yeas but it's not fun if you go into all that descriptive effort and then fail to land a hit, is it?

There is a point at which I agree with this - if the disparity is just huge (and "huge" can be a matter of taste). But losing half the attacks in the case that your DR/defeating weapon happens to be relevant? That's find by me. Losing the +2 in the the "switch to two-handed mode" case - generally also fine (though see my concern below). in some situation, with the right equipment, the monk might get the advantage. As wraithstrike pointed out, the flexibilty of overcoming two different types of DR has a value. Situational difference is GOOD, situational difference is FUN - I expect my character to be outshined sometimes. Not always, of course, but sometimes.

A fighter with TWF can ditch the TWF side of things and concentrate on hitting with normal attacks, and he is rewarded with in effect a +2 bonus to hit. A monk cannot, because then he is not using FoB and reverts to 3/4 BAB.

I'm meh about the +2, as stated above, but it does bother me that the monk has no good "one solid blow" options, ONLY the flurry. Maybe there outta be some bonus feat options like the 3.x Decisive Strike alternate class feature (at monk lvl BAB, I guess)? But that's a seperate concern in my mind.

As for the Fafhrd reference I do wish that I could take two different weapons without suffering for it though. It just takes too many feats for it to work like I want it to.

Philosophical difference, then, to a degree. I mean, I too want a reasonably effective character, and I agree that there is such a thing as TOO much disparity in effectiveness. But if I want a Fafhrd, I'm gonna have a Fafhrd.

One way my various groups have dealt with that is to recognize that any system will have extreme outliers of effectivesness. We're good at FINDING them, usually. The 3.x Spiked Chain. Improved Crit Kukri. One player thinks the two-handed falcata is just a monster weapon. When we find those kinds of things, we don't play with them. They invalidate too many other concepts. Fafhrd (and dozens like him) should be reasonably competitive with kukri-guy, so - kukri guy can't have Improve Crit. Or something. Any build that is outrageously more powerful just needs adjusting.

Values of "outrageously" will vary from group to group, of course.

What do you mean by they will find interesting ways to bring that style into play?

At the pure description level, rather than "my first swing is a 24, my next is a 17, my next is a 21 . . . ", I'd hope to hear "I swing the glaive at his body - 24 hits, right? So I use the rebound from that hit to swing the haft at his knee - 17 misses? - and spin the glaive in my hand for an overhead strike at his head - 21 . . . "

At the more mechanical level, there's now a "second side" to his attack - maybe that encougrages his to take a wider variety of feats (e.g., going back to a weapon & unarmed strike style, since you're going to be using the strike half the time anyway, maybe you take that Gorgon's Fist that looked like a "waste" when your flurry could be with just the one weapon). Or to do a ver of your falcata/cestus choice and enchant one weapon with fire and the strike with ice.

I value that kind of variety and interest over pure numerical effectiveness any day of the week and twice on Sundays (good thing it's not Sunday anymore:-) Now, I don't want to see HUGE disparities in numerical effectiveness (explaining why things like twin imp crit kukri don't really fly), but both my GM's and I (on the rare occassions I GM) prefer "wide" characters to "narrow" ones (if that makes sense).

What is a Fafhrd?

text , and image. Fafhrd is on the right. Doesn't Pathfinder have a recommended reading list? If it does, and Leiber isn't on it, something is WRONG with the universe!

Something I've already learned here: one of the concerns the devs seemed to have in the "can't flurry with one weapon" part of the controversy is that it allows a double-benefit from the enhancements on that weapon. Your build points out that a TWF fighter has MANY double-benefits from paired weapon/feat choices that the monk can't get, or won't get as much of an advantage from ('cause he has no access to something as effective as Improved Crit Kukri).

Someone said they understood me better if I had no Improved Crit Kukri in my games. I understand the desire to have a fully-enhanced single-weapon flurry better if you're trying to compete with dual-wielded, Focused, Specialized, etc. Improved Crit Kukri.

Still don't LIKE it, and I'll be interested to see how my build(s) turn out, but I do understand something better than I did before. Thanks for that, all.