Was map lacking markings for which cage had which creature ever fixed? It's fixed in the hardcover. Counterclockwise from the southernmost, it's skeleton, krooth, empty, chuul, skeleton, empty, empty.
The suggested options table is fantastic. And while I understand that there likely isn't a lot of medicine-related content in the adventure itself, having Medicine "not recommended" makes me wonder whether Paizo has played Pathfinder Second Edition.
It's interesting the places (I think) I can see the seams between the author's turnover and the final product. My group is in chapter two and the walkway above the lake in areas C4 and C5 jumped out at me. It's described in the readaloud text for both areas (in fact, it's a majority of the readaloud text for the two areas!), has the same transparent walls the players encounter elsewhere, has a secret door leading from C8, ... and is completely unused. It's like having a door with intricate carvings described in detail that leads to an empty closet. It really stands out. I vaguely remember a Vanessa Hoskins appearance on Know Direction before the adventure was released where she mentioned that she wrote one level to be able to be flooded and a Paizo person said that that element didn't make it through to the final product. I wonder if the ledge is where that would have happened.
Does the mention of atlatls mean we can expect stats for them?
Note that my XP sheet assumes that the players murder everyone on the drow level. They probably won't.
I made an XP list for this AP. Note that it only includes combat XP. I made this to evaluate what leveling system to use for my tables. The adventure said that there's plenty of XP for a party on the slow track, which I found to be true-ish overall but not for certain chapters. Chapters 1, 5, 7, and 10 don't actually have enough combat XP to level on the slow track.
I don't know where else to post this, so I'll post it here. If you're an artist familiar with Abomination Vaults, I would love to see a Pathfinder Infinite art pack of named but un-illustrated characters, especially the Otari characters.
The point of the giant worm carcass in the dungeon isn't to TPK a low-level group with an encounter featuring an undead purple worm, but to foreshadow the link to the Darklands and to instill in the players a sense of being at the tip of an iceberg where they are facing something truly dangerous. Finding evidence that someone kept a pet purple worm is intended to make the players nervous, not to give them a fight. This was very successful for my group. They flipped the eff out when they found it.
If you're actively roleplaying the concept it's trying to sell, and studying your enemies and staying ahead of the curve, then your marginal benefit is less than if you don't do that. It's funky. That and the more detailed stuff you could prepare (the Implements and scroll feats and whatnot) are actively less powerful because this really strong version of this idea is taking so much of the focus (and "power budget") of the class.So I think the unstated (and incorrect, IMO) assumption here is that the party (or, really, the thaumaturge) would have already been able to exploit a pre-existing weakness. Because doing 2 extra damage against a kobold scout isn't better than doing 3 extra damage against an imp (taking all level 1 examples). It may feel like you did more, but you didn't, because you probably don't have a holy weapon.I guess I'm confused by #2. You think it'll be disappointing when a thaumaturge discovers a weakness that their allies can exploit too? Because, boy, I look at that as a narrative upside (and, of course, it is literally numerically strictly better).It's more that when the thaumaturge benefits more by creating a weakness for a monster that doesn't already have one than it does by exploiting an existing weakness. That isn't what the thaumaturge is trying to sell, though. It's not a class that does studious research ahead of time to find weaknesses; it's one that carries a bunch of weird stuff around, knowing that they can find the right thing to use in the moment. It's extemporaneous. And that's exactly what Esoteric Antithesis does - come up with an answer to whatever they face, even if they didn't know it was coming.
This bothers me to a degree that is probably irrational, so I'm writing it down here to get it off my chest. 2e has pretty detailed rules for identifying magic (and non-magic) items, spells, and creatures, but not, for some reason, hazards. It's particuarly an issue because hazards often have methods to disable them that aren't just "hit it with sword" or "do thievery things." Now, simple traps are mostly pretty simple - noticing a spear launcher is probably enough to see how to disable it. But more interesting hazards often have something you would not know from simply encountering the hazard. And those disable checks are often creative and flavorful! So creative and flavorful that most players would not think of them on their own. How exactly is identifying the skill checks to disable a Ghostly Choir supposed to work? There aren't even skills associated with the Haunt tag. Presumably Religion is the most fitting skill, but what about Occultism? Does a player intuit one, but not all, methods of disabling a hazard if they succeed, with further checks possible at a higher DC? There are answers to all of these questions if we're talking about a creature, but not for hazards. I've even had PFS GMs simply tell the players what the checks are as soon as a complex hazard rolls initiative. Note: I'm not asking for advice on how to run these - I've cobbled together my own way of handling hazards in the games I run. This is more of a request for errata. Given how often hazards show up in Paizo adventures, it would be nice for the game to tell us how PCs are supposed to know what to do with them.
Some of this is just a counterintuitive (and unfortunate, IMO) interaction of the rarity system with recalling knowledge. It's pretty easy to recognize a ghoul and its distinctive features, but if you give a ghoul a name and a spell list, suddenly she is Unique and her basic ghoul details are nearly impossible to discern. The thaumaturge's issue is that it relies on a system that doesn't make much sense when it comes to unique variants of common creatures. Of course, if Dracula were the only vampire, he would in fact be unique and the sky-high DC would be appropriate.
I really like this feat. It could be a lot of fun. But from a narrative perspective, I think this should be a level 1 feat because it allows a character to start play with it active, and therefore not obvious to other players. This sort of pact can be an interesting surprise character twist, but not if it has to happen after several levels of play. The Illusory Disguise benefit could be held off until level 4 to satisfy any balance concerns.
Follow-up observation: Esoteric Antithesis is written to work on one creature, not one type of creature. So a thaumaturge fighting two babaus would have to recall knowledge to understand the weaknesses of babau #2 even if they know the weaknesses of babau #1. Do they simply get the result they achieved before? I would feel pretty silly telling a player that they know all the weaknesses of babau #1 but are totally befuddled by the identical-looking babau #2. Adding something along the lines of "If you have previously used Find Flaws against the same type of creature [insert time limit here?], you automatically achieve the same degree of success as your previous Find Flaws" would solve the issue.
I think Find Flaws should specifically say whether it can be attempted against the same type of creature more than once, especially if the first attempt is a failure. The rules for Recall Knowledge say that future attempts against the same subject are "fruitless" after a failure, which reads to me as all future attempts automatically fail. The "once per turn" frequency doesn't explictly countermand this rule. But can a thaumaturge try again to achieve the benefits specific to Find Flaws? Or if they automatically fail, does this mean a thaumaturge who critically fails can use it again next round to gain the ability to use Esoteric Antithesis as an action? (For that matter, a general FAQ/errata addressing whether actions/activities that provide a benefit based on the result of a subordinate recall knowledge would be nice)
Pathfinder first edition and Starfinder both have Called weapons, but PF2 does not yet have a Called rune. I live in constant fear that my expensive weapon will be disarmed or I'll have to drop it to climb. Please add, Paizo.
Just want to say that Paizo CS got my issue sorted very quickly. They are awesome!
I know it's a pretty standard convention, but I wish the map numbering did not revert to A with the start of this book. I doubt many people will run book 2 or book 3 on its own, and it would make more sense to have the map numbered sequentially since it's all one big dungeon. So maps A through K instead of A-B-C-D-A-B-C-D-A-B-C.
Has anyone put together handouts for the partial maps given by Boss Skrawng or Graulgust?
I have a request for the lizardfolk: their claw attack has no weapon group, so it has no critical specialization. Is this intended? Every other ancestry unarmed attack I've looked at has one listed, generally brawling.
Hello! The Starfinder Society main page (https://paizo.com/starfindersociety) has a link titled Starfinder Society Guide. That link goes to the old PDF guide. It should be updated to the current OP Foundation guide.
A few of the Gunslinger feats mention in different ways (or simply imply, in the case of Deflecting Shot) that you fire your firearm. I suggest that the rules should clarify whether these feats require reloading and expending of ammunition. Deflecting Shot is particularly worth calling out because it doesn't actually say that you fire.
Solution: No one gets the PDF until street date, regardless of when your order ships.If it stops the complaints and helps the industry I am ok with this. However, if that is the solution it means your order gets charged on ship date whether it ships or not? Also ok with that. Least it would be consistent and subscribers who get the books early still get that boon too. One year ago, Paizo did exactly this for the Gencon release of 2e and the board was full of complaints. There will always be complaints. |
