hasteroth's page

The problem with his character (pretty sure this is the game I'm in) is that he's upset that he is interpreting not being able to AoO with a Doshko, not adding 1.5 STR mod to damage with 2h weapons, and Step Up requiring a Reaction as making "all 2h melee fighters useless" or at least. I tried to explain that Step Up is useful for Full Attacks and Step Up and Strike is good later on. Also that there are plenty of high damage 2h weapons that aren't unwieldy. But he insists that 2h weapons are pointless because "1d10 over 1d8 is a negligible difference" according to him.
Essentially it's an unwinnable thing. Because he's very used to the way Pathfinder works, used to the broad selection of feats, used to the action economy, etc that he feels Starfinder is unfairly making "2h melee pointless".

He also refused to acknowledge the fact that he had most of the kills in our first session (over 50% in fact) while I, a melee Solarion with a 1h Solar Weapon... got no kills and spent a lot of my time doing mediocre (relative to him) damage.

I had the same question about Jumping for a Charge. Based on the move action thing it would seem not.

Life Oracles make excellent healers, plus you can build them into Holy Vindicators (Prestige class) starting around level 8. Holy Vindicators are better healers/buffers than Paladins, do fairly well at battlefield control, are much tankier than pure Clerics/Oracles, and can dish out a fair amount of damage. Also, Life is a MYSTERY not an archetype... vanilla Oracles all get a mystery. And the Life Oracle can take the amazing revelation... Life Link. Which mitigates damage AS IT COMES IN, and won't likely endanger you as you can drop the link as an immediate action.

People talk about how healers are essentially meaningless, talk about how wands make out-of-combat healing capability irrelevant... And while the latter is somewhat true, the former I couldn't disagree with more. I've lost count of how many deaths I've witnessed due to the lack of a combat healer. But PURE healing is often not the best plan, you want to be able to contribute to combat in ways other than healing... such as buffing, debuffing, battlefield control, or fighting. Out of combat healers (ESPECIALLY Life Oracles) tend to be very capable with social stuff.

If your goal is to be pure SUPPORT, then Life Oracle will do you just fine. You'll make a good face outside of combat, and in combat you can heal and buff.

Also not sure about merging Bard and Oracle, even though they both focus on CHA. Maybe as a gestalt (if your game is doing that, ) but I don't see a level dip in either doing either any good, especially if you want any emphasis on healing. You'd kinda have to go a little too far into both classes to be worth it and you'd just end up missing out on a lot of your higher level stuff... and you'd find yourself as a dead weight as soon as you get into those higher levels. On top of that if you go Bard with a level dip in Oracle you get stuck with a curse that NEVER improves.

Bottom line, based on the criteria you've given. I'd strongly suggest you go with a pure Life Oracle with some emphasis on buffing. It'll keep you out of the limelight but still keep you useful. You can consider Holy Vindicator prestige at level 8 to improve your combat abilities a great deal, if you do that I strongly recommend you take Fey Foundling as your first level feat and Life Link as one of your Oracle revelations for that self-healing party-healing. Especially since the Holy Vindicator is an amazing self-healer. Also Magical Knack to make up for the couple of caster levels you lose from Holy Vindicator's progression.

Lion Shaman Druid 6/Fighter 1/Master of Many Styles Monk 1/ Beastmaster Ranger 3

Though it was a human

You could try using the Unchained Loyalties system for PCs, but make GM calls as to what is reasonable or not (like not being Loyal to the concepts of Justice and Injustice at the same time). And forbid obviously evil loyalties and characters (GM has final word) when you want to ban Evil alignments. You can even preserve existing alignment mechanics by keeping regular alignment for NPCs (for things like Detect Evil) and make GM calls as to what each character would detect as if that ever comes up (you probably wouldn't even have to tell the players what they detect as).

If a player takes too long, tell them they are delaying. Do not budge on this, do not allow retroactive actions. It might be upsetting and suck at first, but players will acclimate and be happier for it.

When it comes to spells, get the players to print out all the spells they know/regularly prepare so they can quickly reference them outside their turn. Also demand players know any rules regarding what they plan to do.

I would however make exceptions for corner cases, like if something is really confusing and needs to be quickly discussed.

The problem with relying on game mechanics to deal with persistently problematic players is it can fail, and they may not get the message and in the worst case become even more belligerent. If he's as consistently and persistently awful as you've made it sound... Boot him, replace his character with an NPC (or let a player who can handle it play two characters, or just have a free cohort) end of story. The players shouldn't have to suffer him longer than they have to and they shouldn't have to suffer any nonsense that is risked by attempting to "teach him a lesson," particularly when it doesn't seem he'll learn.

The reason I say this is I've attempted the "kill off the character" with bad results, I've attempted every method I can think of to avoid booting a player and hopefully teach him a lesson... It rarely works out, every player I've attempted these things for got kicked out in the end, and it was so much worse for having drawn it out.

I've had players that make the game impossible to enjoy before, the longer you draw out his removal the worse it gets. I once had to boot my roommate out of a game, thankfully he got over it pretty quick.

If he's been warned repeatedly, talked to at length about the issue by other GMs... Boot him.

http://paizo.com/pathfinderRPG/prd/coreRulebook/spells/regenerate.html#rege nerate

The subject's severed body members (fingers, toes, hands, feet, arms, legs, tails, or even heads of multi-headed creatures), broken bones, and ruined organs grow back.

7th level Cleric spell (also 7th level Witch and Shaman)

If you happen by a metropolis as per the lodging and services rules http://paizo.com/pathfinderRPG/prd/ultimateEquipment/gear/lodgingAndService s.html

Not every town or village has a spellcaster of sufficient level to cast any spell. In general, you must travel to a small town (or larger settlement) to be reasonably assured of finding a spellcaster capable of casting 1st-level spells, a large town for 2nd-level spells, a small city for 3rd- or 4th-level spells, a large city for 5th- or 6th-level spells, and a metropolis for 7th- or 8th-level spells. Even a metropolis isn't guaranteed to have a local spellcaster able to cast 9th-level spells.

It would cost 910gp for a cast of Regenerate. Level 13 is the minimum level for a level 7 Cleric spell, so 7x13x10 is 910.

And if your GM is going to toss something like that at a player, he HAS to provide the opportunity for a workaround or a way to heal it. Maybe a high level cleric happens to be in a town you pass through for a few days. If he doesn't, your GM is being a t!+& and unfairly punishing the players.

Knight_Druid wrote:

Thanks for the advice, everyone. Looks like I'll be changing my weapons too daggers, and perhaps carry a short-sword for back-up.

You might want to take a look a the Knifemaster Rogue archetype then.

It bumps your sneak attack damage up to d8s for daggers, but d4s for everything else.

It does replace trapfinding, so he should talk to his GM about that. Since the GM may like to use traps and trapfinding is a requirement for using Disable Device with magic traps.

I haven't had a list of houserules for a while, not since my last home game. Several ones I used have been mentioned here so I'll just drop my favourite one.

Altering Alignments, building off of Unchained Loyalties system I was able to preserve all existing alignment based mechanics while expanding the overall system.

Each player has 3 loyalties which are of progressive importance to the PC. The players can have 2 loyalties which are tied in importance (1 and 2 or 2 and 3).

• The first loyalty should be to a concept (Justice, Greed, Love, Family, Community, Self-Perfection, Lust, Chaos, Law, etc etc) and if your first loyalty is something primarily associated with a god then you may exude an aura which matches the alignment of that god and will detect as that alignment (depending on HD, class features, etc).
  
• All extraplanar outsiders, and bestiary creatures with an alignment subtybe will detect as their alignment. Most bestiary monsters will maintain their listed alignment for mechanical purposes, only NPCs (this includes non-humanoids like Dragons) might be reworked with loyalties (especially if custom).
  
• Paladins must have their first loyalty to a Lawful Good concept or God. Clerics must have a loyalty to a concept within one step of their god's alignment, or to their specific god. Oracles, Warpriests and Inquisitors have a bit more leeway, depending on their character. Anti-Paladins are the exact opposite of Paladins. Druids must have a loyalty something related to nature. Monks should have loyalties to concepts such as Self-Perfection, Order, Law, Calm, etc. Barbarians shouldn't be loyal to Law concepts, but this isn't a hard requirement.
  
• If your first loyalty is to a god, your second loyalty should be to one of their associated concepts, and this suggests a high level of a devotion to the god, requiring you to behave as a devout worshiper of that god would (as in, actually follow the teachings). Just saying you're a worshiper of the god isn't enough. If you only serve the god for an ulterior motive, then your loyalty is not truly to that god.
  
• Other loyalties are totally open and can even contradict each other but have to work within reason. For example a character can't have loyalties to both Law and Chaos (without a really good explanation) and would more likely have a loyalty to Balance. But a character can have a loyalty to Law and Freedom (tied) and battle internally over the concept of Slavery. You can have loyalties to organizations, people, gods, nations, things, ideas, concepts, regions, etc etc.
  
• The GM is the final arbiter of whether or not a character's loyalties are within reason, whether or not a loyalty fits into a specific alignment for mechanical purposes, and whether their loyalties disqualify them from a certain class choice. The GM is also the final arbiter of whether or not alignment mechanics (such as Detect and Smite Evil) work on a particular character.

The whole point of this is how few players I've played with (even high-RP players) are able to really avoid the "does my alignment allow this?" type of thinking. They stick themselves in their box and are afraid to venture out at all, even if they aren't bound by a code like a Paladin. Too often I hear "I'm lawful good, so I wouldn't do that" or "I'm chaotic neutral so I wouldn't care" instead of "My character would care about this, so does x." By expanding it into loyalties it allows players to define their characters morality for themselves, it keeps them from falling into the trap of playing their alignment. They may still end up letting themselves be completely defined by their loyalties instead, but it's still better than being defined by 1 of 9 alignments.

How does this add to roleplay? At all?

You have a mechanic that is just worse than the previous mechanic. It does not require any more roleplaying to add 3 +1s to your character sheet than merely 1.

This is entirely mechanics, pure and simple. Like I said, if this was about roleplaying you'd make earning a language actually require roleplaying. Visiting tutors to learn, conversing with people in your non-native tongue for extended periods, etc. until it finally clicks.

If you want it to be a roleplaying thing, it would be divorced entirely from mechanics.

Your system does not add to roleplaying in any way, it just makes the mechanics less useful.

If he's reworking a system, he could limit it to a rank per level. He could make languages important in his world (enough to really encourage learning more), but make it less important to know a wide variety. There are a million ways this can work and a million ways it can't. He has already said he will be implementing a baseline system and then taking player feedback on it. Presumably if nobody likes it he'll shelve it until he has time to revise it.

Example off the top of my head is the Unchained options for removing alignment from the game. Some of them were easy to work with but overly simple, others were more complex and difficult to implement... all of them had problems. But some of them (like loyalties) provided an excellent baseline to build off of. With RP-first players, the propensity for abuse of mechanics is often pretty low... and in my experience they are willing to yield to Rule 0 more often than not. Other examples are all the alternate magic systems... the alternate action economy, alternate skill systems, alternate crafting, etc etc etc.

Don't rip on and shoot down an idea just because it doesn't sound perfect to you, else you'll run afoul of the nirvana fallacy. You can offer criticism without sounding vicious, it's pretty damned easy actually.

hasteroth wrote:

Reverse bladed katana, because I'm a Rurouni Kenshin fanboy.

I'd also like to see Broadswords added... Cause why do we have Shortswords and Gladius but not Broadswords?

Also Legio, Longsword is an ambiguous term that refers to a very wide variety of one-handed, two-handed and hand and a half swords... But the Pathfinder Longsword is merely a long-bladed Shortsword. Though you are right about Falchions, and Exotic weapons are made Exotic due to their need for specialized training with the specific weapon as opposed to being covered by general martial training.

Longsword is not an ambiguous term in HEMA. It refers specifically to two handed swords of the late medieval and renaissance periods, and is distinct from greatswords or zweihanders. The longsword we have in game is an arming sword.

Exotic weapons are not exotic in a great number of cases. The falcata is not a particularly exotic weapon, nor is the bastard sword, the kama is literally a sickle, the katana is the cultural equivalent of the arming sword in areas where it was prevalent, a khopesh is an ancient weapon, but not an exotic one, a dwarven longaxe or longhammer is a pollaxe or lucerne hammer (which is especially stupid since we already have a lucerne hammer), a sling staff was historically a simple weapon. These are all allegedly exotic weapons in pathfinder, not because they require specialized training to use, but because they are either better than other options, like the katana, or because they are uncommon weapons.

Broadsword, on the other hand, is an ambiguous neologism developed in the Victorian period to refer to certain sorts of older swords, and had very little fixed definition at the time. In modern parlance a broadsword could be assumed to refer to a sort of basket hilted sword prevalent in the 16th through 18th centuries, and distinct from the backsword only in that it has two sharpened edges, but even that is largely a modern way of figuring things.

I mostly stand corrected, particularly about arming swords. But longsword is still a generally ambiguous term that actually includes bastard swords in the umbrella and a few one-handed swords.

But yeah there are definitely a few exotic weapons that shouldn't be exotic. Like the Falcata and Kama.

However the Katana were a cultural equivalent to the arming sword in Japan... but only insofar as how wide-spread they were. The Japanese didn't really have an arming sword equivalent in terms of form and function, the Wakizashi is closest but is essentially a short-sword, though the Wakizashi should NOT be Exotic. As well the Nodachi was their version of a Greatsword (and why the hell is that one NOT Exotic? it's insanely unwieldy)

And speaking as someone who personally trained with a full-sized Katana for many years, they are absolutely not easy to use with a single hand. In Pathfinder they are martial if two-handed, exotic only if one-handed. Believe me it takes years of training to properly handle a katana with one-hand, even so most forms have you only briefing removing your offhand from the grip for one or two strikes. The Bastard sword is also considered martial when two-handed, exotic when one-handed. This seems perfectly reasonable given the size and weight of both the Bastard Sword and Katana

I assume that originally it was just from faulty research back in the old days of DnD, and now it's almost traditional. Also, strapped shields are way more common in movies, because that's what knights used a lot, because of being mounted.

There's a lot of annoying relics from early D&D, since Pathfinder is based on D&D Paizo can't be overly faulted for something like this as it's mostly just fluff anyways. They can't be expected to get EVERYTHING right. Personally I'm houseruling things like straps as accessories for shields the next time I GM a home game... among other changes.

I'm not really sure how the buckler got so corrupted. Pretty much all bucklers were center gripped. The in game buckler is a little closer to being a bracer, though it's not really that either.

Yeah this always bothered me. The IRL buckler is actually a type of targe, but even those targes' were pretty restrictive for what the free-hand could do (this is covered more or less by the penalty to attack rolls made with that hand).

Seems a lot like how Shadowrun handles languages, except more forgiving. In APs I could see this being an issue, since multilinguality is often fairly important in Golarion's adventures. But for a homebrew setting it could work just fine I'm sure. I would nerf the bonuses a bit, maybe consider capping it at fluency with rank 3 and instead homebrew a feat that grants you the rank 4 bonuses to 1 language.

hasteroth wrote:

Silus wrote:

swoosh wrote:

BigNorseWolf wrote:

If being a paladin was easy everyone would do it.

Probably not. Class isn't THAT good.

Aye. But options are limited as the DM is only allowing Core classes, otherwise I'd be rolling up a Warpriest. Or a Kineticist >.>

Edit: Also, decided on Apsu as the patron deity for my Paladin for purposes of Evangelist (thank you Inner Sea Faiths!). Also gets a nifty amulet that allows for a breath weapon and Eagle's Splendor.

The weird thing about Apsu is that it's RARE for non-Draconics to worship him, since as a God he is very singularly focused on his opposition of Dahak. The like... 2 human churches that exist on Golarion are almost entirely focused on performing the tasks requested of them by Apsu's Dragon representatives (usually Bronze) to help ensure that Dahak and his followers don't gain too much strength... though these Dragons usually feel that they do not require the help of humans so these requests are rare. The only care Apsu has for Golarion is that Dahak and he will have their final battle there... otherwise he focuses on Triaxus.

*Grumbles* Well back to Sarenrae I suppose unless I can sorta cheese my way into having a paladin of Brigh or something.

Pshaw, you can worship Apsu as a Paladin all you want. The organization of the faith is just somewhat limited, that's the only caveat. Otherwise you just follow the code.

But generally, I'd like to see a lot more specific and named weapons and armor with unique effects.

Reverse bladed katana, because I'm a Rurouni Kenshin fanboy.

I'd also like to see Broadswords added... Cause why do we have Shortswords and Gladius but not Broadswords?

Also Legio, Longsword is an ambiguous term that refers to a very wide variety of one-handed, two-handed and hand and a half swords... But the Pathfinder Longsword is merely a long-bladed Shortsword. Though you are right about Falchions, and Exotic weapons are made Exotic due to their need for specialized training with the specific weapon as opposed to being covered by general martial training.

swoosh wrote:

BigNorseWolf wrote:

If being a paladin was easy everyone would do it.

Probably not. Class isn't THAT good.

Aye. But options are limited as the DM is only allowing Core classes, otherwise I'd be rolling up a Warpriest. Or a Kineticist >.>

Edit: Also, decided on Apsu as the patron deity for my Paladin for purposes of Evangelist (thank you Inner Sea Faiths!). Also gets a nifty amulet that allows for a breath weapon and Eagle's Splendor.

The weird thing about Apsu is that it's RARE for non-Draconics to worship him, since as a God he is very singularly focused on his opposition of Dahak. The like... 2 human churches that exist on Golarion are almost entirely focused on performing the tasks requested of them by Apsu's Dragon representatives (usually Bronze) to help ensure that Dahak and his followers don't gain too much strength... though these Dragons usually feel that they do not require the help of humans so these requests are rare. The only care Apsu has for Golarion is that Dahak and he will have their final battle there... otherwise he focuses on Triaxus.

Knight_Druid wrote:

Can a rogue dual-weild rapiers? I'm playing an 5th level rogue (core book) and wanted to make sure I was doing it right.

You will take penalties because the off hand weapon is not a light weapon. (Rapiers have special excemptions for weapon finesse but are still not light weapons).

You want your off hand to be a short sword or dagger.

or literally ANY light melee weapon he is proficient with.

Unchained Rogues however only get DEX to damage with a single weapon at 3rd level, so it'd make sense to opt for both weapons being Rapiers if crit range matters more to you than hit chance. Though since he's not going Unchained, he won't be able to use Fencing Grace with Rapiers if you're using TWF... since it was changed by Ultimate Intrigue so that you have to have an empty hand. Meaning he has no way to gain DEX to Damage as a Core Rogue with Rapiers, meaning he has a MAD problem. OP needs to have high DEX to counter the penalties from TWF with 2 rapiers, which will reduce his damage output if he sacrifices STR. But if he bumps his STR up (at the cost of some DEX) he can mitigate the damage difference between Rapiers and Kukri... and mitigate the DEX difference by getting a -2 instead of -4.

You CAN dual-wield Rapiers... but without DEX to damage you can't just dump STR since you need STR for damage. So it isn't really worth the extra -2 penalty. Plus a Shortsword does the same damage (just with a smaller crit range) so using it instead of a Rapier in one hand makes crit range the only difference.
If crit range matters to you then I strongly suggest a Rapier + Kukri. Both have 18-20 crit, Kukri does 1d4 damage instead of 1d6 that Rapier does... but you'll only have a -2 penalty to hit with TWF instead of -4 so you can sacrifice a couple points of DEX for a boost to STR to mitigate the difference in damage by 1 or 2 (unless your abilities are randomly rolled).

Also if you can get Exotic Weapon Profiency (say, as a Half Elf with Ancestral Weapon) consider the Estoc instead of Rapier for the main hand. It's one handed, finesse-able like the Rapier, has the same crit range... and does 2d4 damage instead of 1d6. So you can wield a Kukri in the offhand and actually have higher damage (max is same, minimum boosted by 1) than if you wielded 2 rapiers... but have a higher hit chance. Plus if you so choose you can two-hand it for some extra damage. The flavor of the Estoc is similar to the Rapier... it's a thrusting weapon though it's much longer (and never has a blade, only a point).

Gulthor wrote:

Funny, I feel the opposite way. My preference as a player is to worship a deity.

The paladin can still worship a deity. Just accomplishes as much as a fighter or rogue worshipping a deity.

Clerics derive their divine power directly from their deity if they worship one. Paladins don't have this explicit in their rules... But its rather odd to say that a Paladin couldn't have their power derived directly from the god they worship if they worship one within 1 alignment step.

Yes. You'll take penalties for Two Weapon Fighting whenever you make a full attack with both weapons, so you'll want the TWF feats.

The problem is that since neither is a light weapon, the penalty even with TWF will be -4 on each hand instead of -2.

If you change the off-hand weapon from a rapier to any light weapon though, you can still keep the main hand weapon a rapier and make the penalties for both -2 with the TWF feat.

hasteroth wrote:

Everyone forgets that all of the major gods that are within 1 step of LG have Paladin codes of their own that you can choose to follow. They are found in Inner Sea Gods, I think Inner Sea Faiths might have some too?

I prefer to imagine they don't exist, since it sounds a lot more interesting to me that paladins get their power from objective good rather than the desires and powers of a biased god.

Keep your gods away from my paladins!
*Shakes fist at clouds*

Player choice. A player can play a Paladin that doesn't worship any gods, or who follows the generic code instead of their god's code.

hasteroth wrote:

Murdock Mudeater wrote:

Rather than paladins being inherently lawful good, I'd much rather see the paladin class altered to a custom code per each deity, with the required alignment being exactly that of the deity. That way, at least, players would be playing an alignment they could actually play.

Everyone forgets that all of the major gods that are within 1 step of LG have Paladin codes of their own that you can choose to follow. They are found in Inner Sea Gods, I think Inner Sea Faiths might have some too?

I recall that, I just don't think restrictive alignments generate PCs that actually follow those alignments. I'd much rather have players playing alignments they can actually play, than feeling compelled to take alignments they can't RP very well.

The different codes are neat, but I'd rather have the code specific to the alignment of the deity, rather than the generic LG alignment.

Then play a Cleric or Warpriest? Paladins have abilities that are very very clearly tied to the LG alignment. Though I am in favor of archetypes that allow for a different alignment, which also modify the class' abilities. Like Martial Artist for Monk.

Holy necropost batman

hasteroth wrote:

Mark Seifter wrote:

It's a Campaign Setting book, so there won't be an FAQ or anything official, but you are correct that it is a +1 if you have that Knowledge as a class skill, otherwise it makes it a class skill.

Thanks Mark! So glad to get something at least semi-official from a Designer. Should be enough to prevent any further arguments over it.

Normally, my interpretation wouldn't really be helpful to you on a Campaign Setting book, but I happened to help out and do a pass on a lot of the rules in that one, and in this case, I wrote the original version of the current benefit for that racial trait.

Original? What was changed to the current version? Also given that you wrote the original, and RAI is supposed to trump RAW... Well your post pretty clearly establishes the intent.

Also could it not be argued that bonuses from the same source don't stack? Or is that only untyped bonuses?

Rather than paladins being inherently lawful good, I'd much rather see the paladin class altered to a custom code per each deity, with the required alignment being exactly that of the deity. That way, at least, players would be playing an alignment they could actually play.

Everyone forgets that all of the major gods that are within 1 step of LG have Paladin codes of their own that you can choose to follow. They are found in Inner Sea Gods, I think Inner Sea Faiths might have some too?

It's a Campaign Setting book, so there won't be an FAQ or anything official, but you are correct that it is a +1 if you have that Knowledge as a class skill, otherwise it makes it a class skill.

Thanks Mark! So glad to get something at least semi-official from a Designer. Should be enough to prevent any further arguments over it.

So I feel the need to raise the issue of Comprehensive Education up. The human alternate racial trait has come up in the Pathfinder Society group I play in, and I've been unable to find any official FAQ or clarification of it.

Comprehensive Education: Humans raised with skilled teachers draw upon vast swathes of knowledge gained over centuries of civilization. They gain all Knowledge skills as class skills, and they gain a +1 racial bonus on skill checks for each Knowledge skill that they gain as a class skill from their class levels. This racial trait replaces skilled.

We haven't had any players push the interpretation that it grants you a cumulative bonus to all skill checks... But we've had a couple players push an interpretation that instead of a +1 to each Knowledge skill that is gained as a class skill from class levels... That it is a cumulative bonus where if you have 10 Knowledges as class skills, then you get +10 to every knowledge. The problem is obviously the word "for" rather than "to". But without anything official its been frustratingly difficult to argue against. There's a Wizard with +19 to every single Knowledge at level 1, which is absurd.

I'm hoping somebody has an official clarification to point.

You could theoretically worship a deity that isn't within one step of LG as a Paladin, but if you follow any of said deities teachings there is the possibility it may violate your Paladin Code, and you don't get the alternate Paladin codes which are available with some Deities like Erastil and Sarenrae.

If you worship a Neutral deity such as Pharasma, you could in theory be a Paladin... there just likely isn't a cohesive organization for Pharasman Paladins as there are for say Iomedae, though I'm certain there are some small organized groups of Inquisitors and a loose collection of Warpriests dotted amongst the clergy. But even so you'd be opposed to some of your deity's teachings, which doesn't forbid you from being a Paladin though it does forbid you from being an Evangelist. As well it is likely you'd be more devoted to traditional Paladin ideals rather than your religion if you worship something opposed to your character.

You also ABSOLUTELY cannot be an Evangelist AND a Paladin of a Deity that isn't within one step of LG. Since Evangelists HAVE to worship a single-deity, and the character HAS to be within one step of their deity.

Also, flavor aside there's little reason to choose Pharasma as a Paladin, they stand to gain nothing mechanical from the choice (the favored weapon is a dagger), you limit your Prestige options... It's just not a good choice mechanically.

Also given this is a home game, if I were GMing I'd personally allow worship as a Paladin of any deity aside from NE or CE; though CG, CN and LE would be very hard to justify as well (NN would be just fine for me)... you'd have to have a damn good RP reason for it. And even if I were limiting things to the core classes, I would make an exception in this case to allow the you to play an Inquisitor or Warpriest... since you want the Paladin style without the Lawful Good (which is something I'm totally in favor of). I'd also be open to working with the player to homebrew (or find an existing homebrew) a Paladin archetype for CG or LE alignments.

noble peasant wrote:

Because you become the God of reloading at some point.

Now starting combat TWF repeating HAND crossbows sounds neato...

What domains would the god of reloading grant?

Glory, only Glory.

Because it takes a full-round action to load a new case of 5 bolts repeating crossbow, which Inexplicable Reload only reduces to a standard action. Rapid Reload by RAW doesn't affect it, but if it does apply then it becomes a move action at level 11 with a Heavy, and a Free action just from reload with a light one. With Crossbow Mastery it does however become a free action by RAW. It also takes an exotic weapon proficiency feat to use it.

Whereas with a light crossbow, it only takes Rapid Reload to knock this down to a free action... no Crossbow Mastery required, no exotic proficiency. And with a heavy Crossbow it takes Rapid Reload, and Crossbow Mastery... but still no Exotic Proficiency. Plus repeating crossbows are bloody expensive

I'll break it down

Repeating Crossbow (Heavy and Light)

• Pros: Fires 5 bolts with free actions between.

• Cons: Requires exotic proficiency. Takes full round to reload new bolts. Requires Crossbow Mastery to reduce to free action clip reload.

• Feat Tax to reduce to free action = 5 (including prerequisites): Exotic Proficiency, Rapid Reload, Point Blank Shot, Rapid Shot, Crossbow Mastery

Heavy Crossbow

• Pros: Higher damage than Light Crossbow. Lower feat tax than Repeating Crossbow (due to no exotic proficiency).

• Cons: Full-round action reload without feats. Heavier. Takes more feats than Light Crossbow.

• Feat Tax to reduce to free action = 4 (including prerequisites): Rapid Reload, Point Blank Shot, Rapid Shot, Crossbow Mastery

Light Crossbow

• Pros: Simple weapon, no special proficiency needed.

• Cons: Lower range and damage. Move action to reload without feat.

• Feat Tax to reduce to free action = 1: Rapid Reload

Basically with a Light Crossbow you don't need Crossbow Mastery AT ALL and can go for a different feat. With a Heavy Crossbow you'll want the mastery though. But you don't even need to worry about Exotic proficiency compared to Repeating.

EDIT: Derp, forgot that inexplicable reload + rapid reload only reduces heavy crossbow reload to swift action. Fixed.

Right, but if you can "take 20 on demand when not threatened or distracted" then you'll have an understanding of that. You don't know all the details, but that's not needed. All you know is that this "take 20" thing guarantees you have your best result. We're not saying that every character has a full comprehension of the dice gods and their influence on their lives, but we are saying they have an understanding that they can do a "take 20" have produce their best result possible for them. So just like knowing how to start and drive a car or knowing that you, and everything else, falls cause of gravity you'd know that the thing you do when the player says they "take 20" is something different than just trying 20 times.

OR

Do you supposed that all these adventurers that "take 20" fairly often on a variety of tasks have no idea or concept that they are doing something differently than trying 20 times? because 1 is sure to have their best results, the other has no such promise.

Take 20 is still "trying 20 times," the only difference being that they do a little better each time. It isn't really the character choosing to take 20, rather take 20 is an OOC mechanic where the character tries over and over again, and a nat 20 is rolled at least once. While not strictly guaranteed (technically it's a 63.4% chance) the idea is that if you roll 20 times you'll get a 20.

Basically "taking 20" isn't something done by the character. IC your character is repeatedly attempting the same task, deliberately failing repeatedly so they can learn from their mistakes and do a little better each time, but not with knowledge that they will certainly succeed (a nat 20 could still fail).

When you roll 20 times, you're not deliberately failing and analyzing your failures to learn from the mistake, rather you are simply repeating the task without making any changes based on your previous mistakes. It can be looked at as when taking 20, the character suspects the task will be difficult so opts to take extra time to fail on purpose, so they can better understand the task they are performing. In the case of perception, each attempt in a take 20 you might be trying to look at it from a slightly different angle, narrowing your eyes, leaning in a little closer, etc etc. In order to learn from your mistakes though, you have to minimize distractions, because distractions can impede your ability to do so.

Put simply... taking 20 is mere trial and error, while rolling 20 times is just trial. Trial and error is sometimes phrased as "guess and check" or "generate and test," and rolling is the same thing without the check or test.

Taking 10 was already covered as basically putting average effort into a task that you should be able to perform with ease.

hasteroth wrote:

Traps can be made fun and interesting, particularly if mixed with an encounter. I've seen it done well a number of times. One example off the top of my head is a Kobold ambush with rope traps. The fighter was deliberately running ahead of the group and ended up dangling 10 feet up from a tree while the Kobolds rushed out to swarm the party. This made the otherwise unthreatening Kobolds a very real threat to the Healer, Caster and Rogue. The Fighter managed to cut himself down quickly and the Kobolds were steamrolled. It was an easy encounter overall, but for one moment everyone was scared and tense. It was a simple trap, that spiced things up.

That is absolutely the proper and only way traps should be employed, in my opinion.

A trap on its own is not interesting or a serious threat, unless it can one shot someone. If it can one shot someone it's seriously un-fun for players in general.

Making traps a part of combat is the correct way to use traps.

I get that they're a "staple" of the genre, but trying to make them matter outside of combat is honestly just never going to work. And GMs who try to hard to force just end up earning the ire of their players.

I definitely agree that they are some of the BEST ways to do traps. But not the ONLY way.

A trap which applies a condition to a player for a certain amount of time? Interesting. A trap which splits the party in half for the rest of the dungeon, or maybe just an encounter? That's interesting. A trap which triggers combat? Interesting. A trap which makes a combat encounter more difficult? Interesting. A trap which alerts the nearby guards to your presence? Less interesting, but still makes sense. A trap which hurts someone, but afterwards there is no immediate threat? Not interesting, unless it has some flavor attached to it. A trapped lockbox which bursts into flames if opened improperly (destroying the contents) is interesting, but shouldn't be put on anything overly critical to adventure (without providing an alternative). A save or die trap? Get the f%&% out of here with that b+!#%&++, nobody likes that crap.

Environmental hazards too, while rocks falling from the ceiling is sometimes total BS... it does make some sense in certain contexts. A random pit trap in a forest might be stupid if there's nothing that's actually trying to trap people... but an overgrown sinkhole is fine.

Going to disagree with all of that.

1) There is no rule which supports these claims.

Of course there's no explicit rule against metagaming. There never has been. Rather it is repeatedly implied that OOC and IC knowledge are meant to be kept separate. The intention is very clearly there, that the player and the PC are not the same person in terms of knowledge.

2) All creatures become aware, either intuitively or empirically, of the world around them and the laws that govern it. We know what gravity is, we know the world obeys laws of physics even if we can't articulate them. Characters in the game-verse operate the same way. The have an innate or learned sense of how their world works. And that fact that the rules make it wonky compared to ours doesn't prevent the characters from still being able to grasp game-verse mechanics.

Is every person subject to gravity aware of the exact rate of acceleration which gravity uses and how air resistance applies to objects of different shapes and mass without being educated on the matter? Or are they intuitively aware of how rapidly things will fall based on past experience? Being subject to mechanics (i.e. laws of physics) does not imply a clear understanding of said mechanics. The D20 roll is a simplification of probability, probability exists in the real world, and while one may have an intuitive sense of probability (some things are more likely than others) people aren't granted a full comprehension of how probability functions simply by being subjected to it. Some may, but not all do. An intuitive sense isn't full comprehension, it is akin to a gut feeling.

Another example is a car. I know that pushing down on the gas pedal makes the engine do something and go. I also know that I need gas for it. Even so, I only know these things because I was told them (but perhaps, could've figured it out through trial and error). But that doesn't immediately suggest even a rough understanding of HOW it makes it go. Not every driver understands how the internal combustion engine works (I certainly don't).

3) Characters would absolutely know when they've done poor job searching and a thorough job searching. Walk in to your room and look for six seconds. Are you convinced you've seen everything there is to see? Let's change the skill and talk about crafting something. You really thinking a crafter has no idea about whether she has done her best work or made a piece of junk?

You feel that maybe if you double checked you'd spot something you missed, but you wouldn't know for sure that you observed it poorly the first time unless you do in fact spot something that next time. If a player rolls perception to look at something... if they don't spot anything they wouldn't know there was something to spot unless they successfully spot it later. Or if they knew that something should be there, so intuitively they feel they may have overlooked it so they check a few more times.

Basically:
Roll Perception 1st time: Get an 11 on the die, spot nothing unusual. Nothing indicates that they performed poorly, unless they already know that something SHOULD be there, aside from the die roll itself... but since character don't have the result of a roll in front of their eyes every time they roll... the result is only OOC knowledge, not IC.
Roll Perception 2nd time to double check: Get a 17 on the die, spot something. Realize that your first attempt was poor because your second attempt was successful.

If I nat 1 perception on a doorway, walk through and nothing happens. Well IC I have no idea that I did poorly on my perception, because no trap went off. Whereas if there is a trap, I'm suddenly aware of my poor performance because the trap going off indicates exactly that. Lets say you nat 20, and you still don't see the trap (which would likely indicate an unfairly high DC anyways) well you still feel you didn't do well enough because you still didn't see the trap.

If you're trying to listen to a conversation, there is stimulus present. Failure is obvious immediately upon failure to listen in. The key difference is the presence of stimulus to serve as an indicator of performance. Performance CANNOT be known to anyone without an indicator of it. In the case of failing to perceive a trap, the indicator would either be a subsequent discovery of said trap either by spotting it on another attempt or by setting it off.

Whereas with something like Craft, you'd obviously know when you don't do well enough because you have an object in your hand that may serve as an indication of performance (especially if you are aware of what is good). If there is some change (or particular result) or lack of change where a change is known to occur upon poor performance... that is an indicator of poor performance. But if no change is KNOWN to occur on a failure, IC the PC would have no indication of their performance. When you fail to spot something you don't already know should be there, you are not aware that you failed to spot it. The trap doesn't pipe up with "hey you missed me that time, maybe I'm still here, check again." But the piece of junk you Crafted, still looks like a piece of junk.

"I know my keys are somewhere in my apartment" is good enough to keep looking until you find them. "I think there might be a trap on that door" is good enough to double or triple check. "I think there might be a trap in this room" is not good enough to spend an hour standing in the corner staring at the room. "I'm sure there's a trap in this room, because the map that so-and-so gave me says there is one." Is good enough to spend an hour staring at the room, maybe. But a lack of traps leading to nothing spotted on a take 20 could still leave the PC uneasy depending on their confidence in themself (which is a facet of personality and will vary PC-to-PC), because they don't necessarily know they did as well as they had... and may still be worried about the trap they believe is there. A confident PC might chance the room, and discover it wasn't trapped... A particularly unconfident PC might decide not to risk it, and look for an alternate route. I'll use Schrodinger's cat as a loose example, you don't know that cat is dead or alive until you open the box. If you don't (or can't) spot the trap in the doorway you won't know if it's there or not until you walk through it.

It's not metagamey nor any RP problems. If that's how the rules of the world work to find traps, and your character wants to find all the traps then that's what you do.

I don't even know where to begin with that. Metagaming is by definition the use of OOC knowledge to make decisions. It varies in severity, some of it is excusable (and not too hard to justify IC) such as keeping your distance to avoid AoOs (since keeping your distance is a valid tactic to begin with).

Characters in the game are not going to know how the mechanics of something like perception works vis-à-vis the rules of the game. They would know that they can see and hear, and that unfavorable conditions make it harder to see and hear. But they wouldn't know that spending enough time in the corner of a room would guarantee they find any traps that are possible for them to find, they don't know what a D20 roll even is. In fact IC a character shouldn't be able to tell if they performed poorly on any skill checks that don't give an immediate indication of how poorly they performed (i.e. you wouldn't know that you failed to perceive the trap until the trap goes off). Double-checking is reasonable, even triple-checking sometimes. But excessive unwarranted caution is beyond reason. (Cases where it would be warranted are obvious, such as the GM going full-Monty with traps in every room)

All things considered, I'd still keep INT tied to Skill Ranks. But introduce the Background Skills from Unchained which every character gets 2 ranks for each level.

• Appraise
  
• Artistry
  
• Craft
  
• Handle Animal
  
• Knowledge (engineering)
  
• Knowledge (geography)
  
• Knowledge (history)
  
• Knowledge (nobility)
  
• Linguistics
  
• Lore
  
• Perform
  
• Profession
  
• Sleight of Hand
  

It's also the sort of result you get when your GM has taken an adversarial position against the players (instead of the position of facilitator) and refuses to allow reasonable things like take 10 on perception as they're walking their whole way through the dungeon. Its very reasonable for players to say, "My character is doing his standard job of looking and checking around for things in general as he is walking through wherever they are. If there is something I really want to inspect more closely I'll let you know." If they choose to inspect more closely they can either take 20 (if time is no issue) or roll in hopes that they do better than take 10.

But if your the type of GM who is being a jerk and saying they must announce that they're rolling perception every 10ft and that they can't take 10 do so...well you're just being a jerk.

And if the problem is that you feel this makes traps uninteresting...its because traps are mostly uninteresting and not fun antiquated pieces of the game leftover from a time when the game was commonly an adversarial relationship between players and GMs. These days, traps usually at worst deal a little damage which is promptly healed with a wand of CLW and forgotten or the trap is so powerful that it outright kills someone because they didn't have a chance to detect it. Which is super not fun.

And if nothing else you have inventive players who will start using summoned creatures (especially the mount spell which lasts hours per casting) start preceding the party everywhere they go to set off all the traps in advance.

I actually feel that EVERYTHING either the GM or players do has to be reasonable and justifiable. It doesn't need to be iron-clad, it just can't be obviously metagamey, or (in the case of the GM) unfair. Passively taking 10 is totally reasonable to me (if the players are moving at normal speed, not rushing through), just as taking 20 to inspect a doorway is (just watch out for impatient PCs). But taking 20 to inspect every 10x10 area of an unsuspicious room just in case there might be traps is a bit ridiculous, unless your GM has been a dick about traps up until that point (thus providing an in-character justification for the excessive caution).

Traps can be made fun and interesting, particularly if mixed with an encounter. I've seen it done well a number of times. One example off the top of my head is a Kobold ambush with rope traps. The fighter was deliberately running ahead of the group and ended up dangling 10 feet up from a tree while the Kobolds rushed out to swarm the party. This made the otherwise unthreatening Kobolds a very real threat to the Healer, Caster and Rogue. The Fighter managed to cut himself down quickly and the Kobolds were steamrolled. It was an easy encounter overall, but for one moment everyone was scared and tense. It was a simple trap, that spiced things up.

But some traps are b@++~&&~ like the following

but this one was neat

hasteroth wrote:

There's also absolutely no rule that establishes an effective range or specifies whether or not you have to analyse something specific or can simply attempt to perceive everything within your line of sight/hearing/etc.

Wrong - Ultimate Intrigue officially puts the Pathfinder Unchained rule into the rules (and not alternative). Active perception checks are no more than 10x10 and often can and should be smaller spaces - the given example is a cluttered area where a given check is only 5x5.

So the official rule is 10x10 or less per check, up to GM discretion.

Is that so? If so, terrific. It can easily be used with the passive perception where PCs are always taking 10 when not distracted.

You could still "scan a room" by looking at each 10x10 area and rolling an individual check for each (or take 10 or 20 on the whole room, or allow the player to choose to use a single roll before rolling). It'd be a move action for each 10x10 area, thus determining the length of said scan. Say a 50x50 room, it'd take 25 move actions or 1.25 minutes... taking 20 would take 22.5 minutes. Everything is quadrupled in a cluttered room where you can only do 5x5 squares.

Taking 20 can easily be justified in a cluttered room where you need to find something, and you think it might be there (and you have time to do it). But a largely bare and unsuspicious room likely wouldn't warrant taking 20... unless every room you've been through up to that point has been trapped.

No, the players just say they take 20 on everything to search everywhere and never move until all their take 20s are done and have come up saying it's safe to move. They player says that and then the GM gives them all the traps that perception +20 will find. Thus the only traps that go off are ones that they cannot see ever. It's not a big issue for the players to say they are doing this and it's still "frustrating" for the GM cause all the traps are still found.

Now this is of course assuming that the players don't want to trigger traps. If they don't care then you didn't need to go to such lengths.

So in the end it's no net change for adding extra work.

Yet it's metagamey as f~+$. Taking 20 100 times for perception takes 100 minutes at least... No sane person will spend an hour and forty minutes staring at a room just to make sure there aren't traps. You'll have an insanely hard time justifying RP-wise standing in the corner of the room for that long... Though the GM can easily cut you off by just introducing a distraction or threat, perhaps that Owlbear wandering around the dungeon stumbles into that room... and in the middle of combat you step on the trap trigger in the middle of the room.

I fully believe that taking 20 is reasonable when a person is inspecting something they have good reason to believe may have a trap (such as a doorway, an unusually colored floor panel, etc etc) otherwise they should be rolling (as many times as is reasonable, at worst "triple-checking") or taking 10. Taking 20 is also perfectly reasonable when searching for something you think might be in a room (like a key in an office).

In the end, Pathfinder arose from a wargame which had roleplaying bolted onto it. Any attempt to make it a reality simulation game is doomed from the outset.

I disagree almost entirely. Pathfinder can be made to reflect reality to a reasonable degree so long as an entire table is on the same page regarding HOW it reflects reality, there are plenty of houserules that can improved this. As well good roleplaying by players and GM, and good storytelling can really enhance the effect.

It's only doomed if you won't agree to run with what the rest of the table agrees on, or you run afoul of the nirvana fallacy where anything short of "perfection" isn't worth pursuing.

There is no rule in Pathfinder that restricts a perception check to a 5' square. That was a 3.5 rule. Move action -> take 10 for perception check on corridor, standard action -> move 30' down corridor. Given the party has players in heavy armor, we only lose 10' of movement/round over double moving.

There's also absolutely no rule that establishes an effective range or specifies whether or not you have to analyse something specific or can simply attempt to perceive everything within your line of sight/hearing/etc. The whole ability seems to be left deliberately vague, so it falls on the GM to decide what is appropriate, even in PFS. If a GM says you have to explicitly search for traps in order to find a trap, and that you have to specify exactly where you are looking... nothing forbids nor contradicts this, since no parameters are specified at all.

Personally after giving it some thought I feel I would run it this way in the future. You can generally perceive anything (accounting for range and other conditional penalties) from where you are standing if it is visible from there. If you don't specify you're searching the table, you won't find the false bottom in one drawer. I would allow players to roll a single check, or take 10/20 in a room to search it and it would depend on the size of the room for how long this takes (with take 20 taking 20 times as long, reflecting a thorough and careful search) with a successful rolled check or take 10 (if they would spot it on a take 10) they would find any traps in the room without setting it off. But a take 20 would automatically set off any traps if they would fail on a Nat 1 (as they would be moving around the room, repeatedly failing their check before ever spotting it, walking over whatever would trigger it) with the exception of doors that have to be opened to trigger.
I would also treat the players as passively taking 10 on perception as long as they are not distracted or threatened. And whenever they want to perceive something, the roll would be a secret roll (much like trap spotter)... so they wouldn't know whether they rolled high or low (eliminating the blatant metagaming that is rolling until a high roll happens). And they'd be allowed to double or triple-check. I'd obviously ask each PFS table how they feel about this method before running it, but with home games I'd very strongly encourage this method be used.

hasteroth wrote:

And regarding taking 20 as was mentioned a moment ago. It requires that there are no immediate threats, and requires a couple minutes to perform. And there's nothing which establishes the range of perception and it is left up to GM discretion. So a GM can easily nerf taking 20 by requiring it be used on specific squares, and applying penalties for distance, and unfavorable (or terrible) conditions, or by introducing distractions in the minute spent taking 20 on a square. Or (and I think this is perfectly reasonable) for a home game you can forbid taking 20 on traps, as it can trivialize traps with pedantic or anal retentive players.

As there are no penalties for failure on perception, as I player I simply continue rolling dice until I roll a number I am happy with.

This may bog the game down somewhat, but low die rolls and random results will still not lead to a failure to notice traps. This is the scenario Take 10 and Take 20 averts. Not the die rolls and fixed outcomes, but the time a player will spend sitting there rolling dice until he is happy with the result.

Yeah but this still can develop into an RP issue. One example I can think of is the impatient Barbarian doesn't want to wait while you stare at something until you get a Nat 20, so he wanders through the door (or hallway, or path, etc etc etc) anyways. It can also often be hard to justify, in terms of RP, taking longer than reasonable to check an area for traps. Most people would look once, some might double check, a few might triple check. But "rolling until you get a high roll" is a bit metagamey.

If a player isn't going to be a pedantic, anal-retentive twit then the GM can be more forgiving, letting perception checks be rolled against greater than a single 5 foot square, placing less punishing traps, etc. But if he is... Then the GM is likely going to find the easy ways to subvert the player's shenanigans, by making perception for traps apply to single squares and putting traps in hallways (instead of just on doors), etc.

Can I just toss this wrench into the mix? Empiricist Investigator with Student of Philosophy... And has High INT, low WIS and CHA. Uses INT for Sense Motive, Perception, Disable Device, Use Magic Device, Diplomacy, and Bluff (except to Feint).

I feel like Sherlock Holmes would fit this more or less, since he is able to apply his incredible intelligence to his observation, reading people, getting what he wants, etc. But by all accounts he still clearly lacks basic sense and his social skills are generally appalling.

It's extremely pretentious to even think that your party actually found every piece of treasure in a campaign.

Not to mention it reflects very poor record keeping by the players, and suggests they may not be giving the game their full attention while playing. If you have genuine attention issues (perhaps severe ADD) then maybe ask that a loot tracker and/or record keeper be designated, and maybe don't play the leader/face/whatever requires you to know what's happening all the time.

Reading the same adventure keeps me invested in that story which makes it easier to come back to said story later and roleplay in that story. Reading something else is more likely to detract from my level of investment than it is to help me stay involved. I don't do this but if a DM okayed it I might.

But this is your individual circumstance, and not the "general issue" being discussed. If you ask your GM and he says "go ahead" then there's absolutely no issue at all. OP had a player who maybe thought he had permission when he didn't, obviously booting him is an extreme overreaction as based on the context we have we don't know if he has been or will be cheating, and it seems that his GM being unaware was unintentional.

Whether I ask or not, I will generally assume my players are being honest. Frankly assuming everyone is lying to me doesn't improve anything, as I will be running the entire game expecting my players to cheat, that doesn't sound like fun for anyone, least of all the GM. However if I learn that my trust was misplaced, then there may be an issue.

If I as a GM knew there was some stuff in the AP or module which I wanted to be a surprise, I would certainly ask my players if they've read or played the adventure before. I would also expect them to tell me even if I didn't ask, this is certainly expected (even demanded explicitly in the Guidebook) for PFS. If we get partway into a module and something tips me off that a player has read or played it before (and I hadn't asked)... and I ask him and he admits then depending on the circumstances and the player, I might still let it slide if no metagaming has occurred (especially since some players aren't aware that it could be an issue), but I'll still be wary of the possibility of of it, and will probably make some minor changes to the rest of the module. If moderate to severe metagaming occurs, and the player hadn't told me they'd read it, depending on how impactful the metagaming was I might not tolerate it.

Now if I ask, and they outright lie. As soon as I discover they lied, there are zero excuses, that player is out. End of story. How it affects the game is irrelevant, I refuse outright to play any games with people who abuse my trust.

PS. I always ask but I'd probably make an exception in PFS (I've only GM'd PFS once so far) except for the replayable adventures like The Confirmation, and only so I can know if there's anybody who hasn't and doesn't want to be spoiled... If everybody has, everyone can openly discuss spoilers, which is fun in its own way.

GM 1990 wrote:

At my home game, however, I don't typically allow take 10 for finding or disabling traps. Pits - yes; but anything with a trigger - no. My reason is that the very action of looking for a trap often requires more than just visually inspecting or looking for something. You may need to touch, feel around, wipe away dust and cobwebs, etc to uncover a trigger/tripwire/pressure plate; and that action may set it off.

I go almost exactly the opposite, I'm afraid. I'm fairly explicit that all characters are at all times assumed to be taking 10 if possible to detect traps, ambushes, and the like.. This, in turn, prevents meta-gaming when I ask for Perception rolls, and speeds up play immeasurably. (Nothing grinds the game to a halt like stopping every 10 feet to roll a die.) Players, of course, can ask for a Perception check any time they like....

That's really a terrific idea actually. I kind of love it. With Trap Spotter it changes that Take 10 for locating traps into a secret roll made by the GM. Anything to keep gameplay smooth, meta-gaming to a minimum, and preserve immersion. But since you can't take 10 while distracted, you should find a way to let your players know when they are distracted.

And regarding taking 20 as was mentioned a moment ago. It requires that there are no immediate threats, and requires a couple minutes to perform. And there's nothing which establishes the range of perception and it is left up to GM discretion. So a GM can easily nerf taking 20 by requiring it be used on specific squares, and applying penalties for distance, and unfavorable (or terrible) conditions, or by introducing distractions in the minute spent taking 20 on a square. Or (and I think this is perfectly reasonable) for a home game you can forbid taking 20 on traps, as it can trivialize traps with pedantic or anal retentive players.

Yeah like others said. Touching just requires touching. Armor, natural armor, etc don't interfere with you not being able to be touched. While Dodge, DEX, Deflection etc make it easier to avoid being touched by moving out of the way or deflecting the touch magically.

Monk's wisdom is a special case where it isn't really explicit what it does, its more or less assumed that their ability to react (and block/dodge with their hands/body) is so good that it allows them to avoid attacks better than most, even when flat-footed. This is supported by them being denied it when immobilized

So it isn't buried in my posts, since several people quoting me have clearly misunderstood my arguments.

Prereading an AP is fine in and of itself. But if you play it, tell your GM you read it, so it can be worked around or the GM can decide to just trust you not to metagame. You do not get to demand people just trust you, trust has to be earned, and can easily be lost through dishonesty.

1) Who said to be dishonest about having read the module or AP because there were no posts that I saw that advocated that? I did say that if you are going to cheat then don't tell people. That's just a fact the same way you shouldn't video tape and put on youtube instances of you cheating in a game it's just cheating badly. I'd opt to not cheat if given the choice but if you're going to cheat it's assumed you're trying to cheat well.

This entire time Johnnycat nobody should expect their players to be honest about meta-knowledge. Insisting that it should just always be assumed that players have read the module or AP. He has been railing against the argument that meta-knowledge even has a propensity for being problematic.

2) People enjoy different things, some people love jump scares, and surprises, and cliffhangers, and some people abhor them. Let people enjoy the game however they want to enjoy it as long as they don't ruin it for everyone else. If they have more fun by reading the APs to get in the mood for RP or whatever that's fine. Besides in a game that meet once or twice a month there's an awful lot of empty non RP time between sessions which can really make you feel out of the story your characters are in which kinda sucks.

But why do you need to read ahead in the adventure you're currently playing? Are you so bloody impatient you can't wait till the next session? You can't occupy yourself playing or reading something else?

3) As far as supporting pre-reading adventures eh I don't do it but if someone does I'm not going to support someone else trying to shame them and tell them they're playing the game wrong because I'm not an a!*!*~!. Well I'm not always an a##$!+%.

Assuming the people are being honest about it. Yeah I agree, shaming them for it does make you an a%~!$+%.

Nowhere in any of my posts have I shamed people for metaknowledge. I made it VERY explicit that there isn't a problem if you're honest about it to allow the GM to decide whether he would be more comfortable making changes to the module. I have made it very very clear that my problem is with dishonesty not metaknowledge in and of itself. Several others have attempted to shame people for not being totally comfortable with others being dishonest.

4) In regards to walkthroughs, synopses, etc. Who cares? If you don't like to play games or read books or watch movies like that then good for you do what makes you happy but if you see somebody look at the last page of the book and then read the rest of it or read a walkthrough then play a game do you run up to them and berate them and tell them they're ruining the experience? If you do I'm very happy I don't know you.

Did I berate anyone? No I took issue with advocating for it and shaming people who don't like doing it themselves, and who find it strange that other people like doing it.

If I had know that Battle of Bloodmarch Hill opened with a "whodunit" I wouldn't have spent a month of my life playing through it.

Prove meta-knowledge is an inherently bad thing and isn't an assumed part of the game.

Otherwise I can't see much else going on beyond "stop liking what I don't like".

Well. How about that whodunit right there. Knowing "whodunit"(whether intentionally or not) will inform your decision making as a player. It can be worked around if you tell your GM that you know already, they can perhaps make significant (or even minor) changes that dampen your advantage (or perhaps work that advantage into the story, by making you a witness with motives for not being forthright with your knowledge, in which case only the GM should know of your knowledge).

However you keep arguing a straw-man, the argument nobody has made that "all meta-knowledge is bad." No we have specifically been arguing that meta-knowledge of the specifics of a module can be problematic, and you need to be honest with your GM about that, but that it can be worked around. Being dishonest about it is often problematic as it can create major trust issues between you and the others due to the high-propensity for metagaming abuse. Being dishonest about it generally suggests a number of things; one that you have a motive for withholding the pertinent information, two that you can't be trusted not to metagame (compounded by the suspicion of a motive). If you had no intention of metagaming or cheating, why is it a problem to be honest and forthright?

Perhaps a bit less extreme than the example I'm about to present, but the principle is similar... You lived in an apartment that you moved out of, but you still have a copy of the key. Your friend moves in and doesn't know you have the key still. Maybe you had absolutely no intention of going into their home, well if your friend finds out about that key he's going to be pretty upset and probably change his locks... because how does he know you didn't make copies? Now if you just told him you had the key before he moved in, maybe he might be comfortable letting you hold onto it as an emergency key. Maybe he might want it back, cause he just isn't comfortable with anyone else having a key. But your honesty makes you more trustworthy, it makes the person less likely to suspect you of wrongdoing. The same thing with meta-knowledge, maybe the GM is fine with it and willing to trust you not to metagame due to your honesty.

And exceptional circumstances are only a valid argument against "always" or "never," not "often" or "can be."

Having read the blurb on the paizo website or on the back of the book is something else entirely, something nobody is going to be expected to share as it isn't really spoiling much. Being aware of some of the key events in an AP or Module isn't always going to be an issue either, the only real problem is knowledge of "specifics" Despite how much you insist it is (and it might be the case with your group), having read the entire module or AP that is going to be played is NOT an assumed part of GMing the game.