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I'm probably only going to have the crocodile use it with a good Avoid Notice either way. It seems like a lot of work to Stride back into the water, Hide, Sneak, then use Aquatic Ambush. Yeah, I can't see them doing it (without some kind of magical compulsion). The one thing to know about crocodiles is that they are lazy. As reptiles that can store a fair bit of fat in their tails, they can go up to a year without eating. So they are masters at picking their battles.
I would run it that the crocodile DOESN'T know, but it tries to do it anyway. As you noted, aquatic ambush is just a single action move+strike with some bonuses based off of the idea that it is attacking defenseless prey. If the prey is not defenseless, then I'd rule that there is enough of an actual engagement that the crocodile could not sneak anything in.
The group already has a beastkin so I can't be one. Probably to help provide some variety in the party. If this kind of detail is going to be used narratively, then it might get awkward since different characters have the same story beat. Do you for them to have the story beat at the same time? One after the other so they each get their own focus? But then the rest of the party might be a bit tired of getting the same story beat twice in a row. Example- two dhampir characters, each with their own individual vampire dad. It might mean two quest chains in a row where you deal with someone's vampire dad. Now there are ways around these problems, but they need effort and coordination, or else you are going to get a "we are wearing the same thing to prom" situation. Example- you can have the sibling dhampirs that share a vampire dad. Thus, the story beat is shared.
30-50 Corvid HogsStrigiform-ursine hybrids They could lean into the classic gryphon niche for an apex predator of lower level forest kind of vibe. But that tends to imply flight, in which case it might edge into a harder fight. So: Chicken-gryphs. As you would expect, they can't really fly (although they can glide. Fierce, highly territorial, and some nobles pay good money for live ones for use in live combat arenas.
I think being unshackled from the OGL is only a good thing. Just seeing all the different designs of dragons is amazing, they're all so much more unique and vibrant, and now that you don't need to worry about chromatic/metallic, there's much more room to design new true dragons without going to other planes. I think it is a good thing as well, but I still get very strong "messy divorce" energy at this point. Not saying it won't be great once everything settles. But we are at the "I have to move to a new city, get a new job, and form a new social circle" phase of that experience.
Other than mother vulture, I am pretty sure all of those are evil gods. And the only truly problematic part for mother vulture clerics is their...diet. The rest of the details are just normal murder hoboing as a good or neutral cleric. You know, murder for quests, horde every item you find, not really add anything to the local agriculture industry. Honestly, I think mother vulture might make a suitable Lamashtu replacement for a player goblin. everything on that list seems right up a goblin's alley.
Let's assume you go a straight line going from 20' range in from to 20' range behind the enemy. Let's assume one action for movement, since you want to attack twice. That needs 50' movement speed when tumbling through a medium creature. (40' if you are just trying to stay at the range of regular daggers). Possible, but it needs some work. I realize you aren't going full on ranged. I just imagine that you would want a hill giant to have to take a 5' step to reach you.
A large portion of the societies in setting are feudal. Which in your friend's terms means: "A nation with a relatively weak central government that is mostly ruled through the use of local warlords with minimal oversight. Action is usually only taken against them if they attempt military coups or treason with a neighboring power. The keys to power are held by a wealthy elite class that owns a large proportion of the country's property rights, and power is usually transferred in a despotic manner through hereditary inheritance. Only a very small proportion outside of the elite class have any say in governance, and it is typically easier to curry favor with the hereditary warlords. Democratic principles are a minority in most of the region."
I would question how much tumble behind helps a throwing build. You have to move in close, and it is considered difficult terrain when you pass through the enemy's space. So you might not be able to keep distance appropriate for ranged attack builds, and you might as well just melee at that point. Admittedly, switch hitting is one of the key advantages of throwing builds, but I don't think it is the flavor they were looking for here.
But the Remaster has not changed Calistria nor her followers one bit. So what is true now was true before and vice versa. I think the problem is that alignment as a verifiable concept might be gone, but general social concept would still be there- and without an objective metric to hold it back. Basically, it now seems very easy to just accuse a god of being "evil". I mean, she is a god that advocates wild sex, vicious revenge, and has been known to hang out with demon lords (sure, she was tricking them, but appearances). So there is material there to throw around wild accusations. I'd imagine that might be popular in a nation that really doesn't like elves. While having alignment as a palpable, verifiable aspect of the world can be silly, it does provide some advantages. Before, if you wanted to get a general read on a where a deity stands, you could just ping their clerics. "Oh, they got CG and CE clerics? Then she is probably chaotic neutral". Now admittedly, there could be some curb balls with concealment spells or maybe the god just forcing the matter with a CG oracle that they tricked. But outside of small time local deities outside of the wider public eye, these tricks only carry so far they are revealed. However, the removal of alignment provides "evil" deities with far more breathing room, and they can more easily in turn launch smear campaigns against all the other deities. Basically, what I'm saying is that Asmodeus' greatest trick was convincing the world that alignment didn't exist. He seems to be the one with the most to gain out of all this. So it is time to start a campaign to fight the cult that has taken over Paizo's offices.
I think any discussion about wild west style justice is moot since they were able to take 3/4 of the bandits in without any notable difficulties. Wild west justice was often dictated by the harsh realities of the environment. It would be a very different prospect if you are a 200 mile walk to civilization and you barely have enough supplies for 4 people. And the captives seem dangerous enough to slip out and cut your throats in the night. But that is not what we're dealing with. They even came with their own mule to carry them. You could hog tie them and wrap them up like mummies, and it would have little effect on your travels.
That's what I immediately thought of, but I thought that geas was specifically dog flesh, not generalized carrion.A reference to Cú Chulainn? You might be right on that one.
Let's go classical. A paired set of anathema 1. You cannot eat carrion meat (ie- no road kill)
Post-remaster, cavern elves are known as Ayindilar elves, and they descend from those who sought the Darklands as shelter after Earthfall. They maintain isolated, self-sufficient settlements in the Darklands, and may have had grander cities that are now ruins in parts of the Darklands. They replace what happened to the elves who fled into the Darklands in 1st edition lore and became drow but do NOT fill the drow niche. They'll fill a new niche and will represent a friendly element in the Darklands for people to encounter at some point, but we haven't yet explored this topic at all in print beyond a single paragraph in the "Return to the Darklands" article that appeared in the Sky King's Tomb Adventure Path. While I understand that certain "outside" pragmatic concerns require you to move away from drow, I am not sure how well a "friendly element" might work within the setting. When looking at these, I am forced to think about how the dwarves known for steadfast devotion to tradition and history- chose to leave the darklands. And for good reason, since the darklands are an unfriendly place to...pretty much everyone. It raises the question "why don't the cavern elves leave?", or at least "why don't they primarily stay near the surface, like dwarves". In comparison, Drow are unfriendly, to say the least, which helps them to thrive in that environment. Since they are hostile with most elves (and pretty much any culture that are familiar with their 'new employee recruitment programs'), they find it hard to establish a foothold above ground. But there would likely be a cultural resistance against full on attempts to abandon their underground empire. Their entire conception was born out of a desire to hold fast to their home, even when faced with an increasingly hostile world. Despite the warping they suffered, they managed to survive, thrive, and even dominate. So they are already well entrenched in a preexisting empire that serves as a major player in their region- which further limits desire to move and make a fresh start. Of course, despite all these concerns... I understand that there is generally a need to move away from drow, and trying to make the parts work in setting may have to take a backseat.
Likely intentional. PF1e had a long and dark history of catfolk barbarian/alchemists that were raised by half orcs.
Likewise Bastard Sword is still the only straight bladed sword or knife that doesn't have Versatile. Also the cost makes no sense either, four times the cost of a long sword or twice the cost of a Great Sword! Did they change anything at all that would make Versatile P useful? Piercing damage has traditionally been extremely situational. Most creatures with a weakness to it also have weakness to slashing. So unless you are fighting rakshasa under water, it has been limited in use. I could even argue that the older DnD editions relegated piercing as a punishment for weapons that were deemed too good- such as archery and half decent simple weapons that could be used by non martial classes (back when that was a thing that actually mattered).
Eh. An emperor is someone who has multiple kingdoms or even kings under them. At one point the Five Kings Mountains were a lot more strictly unified, enough that it's kinda a mountain empire. So did they elect a high king to rule over the assembly? Maybe on some kind of rotational system generation to generation among the five? I mean, obviously that goes out the window once the Five Kings become divided and everything devolves into internal bickering. But during the hey day did they effectively have an emperor?
You could go for a number of skills like Lore(undead) to cover the options under the wis skills. Even a wizard could RK on every creature type with Int at level 1 this way. Lore skills can also get automatically upgraded if you spend a skill feat on each one. ...but this is a LOOOONG way to go in order to copy what a Thaumaturge does without any significant investment. It is still fun and thematic for a wizard that usually doesn't have much use for skills related stuff.
How are bards Overpowered? I would also argue that they are good in a party with casters- at least once they get to level 6 and can grab Dirge of Doom. No save, AoE, single action cantrip that can frighten every enemy in a fight. It is a better evil eye than the actual evil eye from witches. Frightened is one of the general purpose debuffs you can add that helps everyone, since it lowers enemies' attacks, defense, and saves. So you could use it to help your save or suck characters better. I agree that bards have more to offer martials (or at least people with battle minions), but a bard is never left high and dry in any party.
I might be taking this to a slightly off topic and farcical conclusion, but the thread title made me curious: Does dying interrupt rest? Let's say that you get assassinated in your sleep. Assassin just gets a really good crit roll, and you never even wake up. And you were 7 hours into an 8 hour rest. Your cleric spends 10 minutes casting Raise Dead. Can you go back to sleep for an hour and still get your full rest?
It might be faster just to look at an egg that is hatching and use the cracks on that to define your tectonic plates.
While the titles of 'clergy' might vary, I have to wonder if there is some standard for 'clerics'. I mean, it feels important to have some clear way to indicate to people "I can fix your wound if you get stabbed by a goblin". Much like how a person might introduce themselves as "Dr. Jones". Not everyone in the clergy has magic, and despite that they might have a high rank within a religious organization. However, in certain emergency situations, the distinction between deacon and bishop is less important than the ability to turn undead. At the very least, I feel like wizards would completely ignore the terms used by most religious organizations and just use a standard term for pragmatic of use. I could see them just using some term from the Nethys church as a standardized code for "guy that can solve the undead problem in the basement of my wizard tower".
The PFS note says if you use it to fill a 5' cube you can use it for either cover or concealment, but not both, although it doesn't block line of sight. That's a good cantrip! Arrows don't have very good saves to disbelieve illusions.
1. No, you will pretty much never use the P option. Honestly, I have to stretch and search for situations where it can come up other than "underwater when you are doing one of the pirate campaigns". I usually just ignore the P on versatile weapons. Raze is similarly specific. I won't say you will never had to destroy items, but it is usually not a popular option since that could damage loot. 2. You are already aware of the trade offs of these two weapons. I think the consistent damage might be better if you are the main melee character in the party. The lower one handed damage might be fine if you are setting things up for a barbarian or something that can get big hits in. I assume that you won't have the actions to mess around with regripping your weapon since you have a pet. Although you might also use your pet for set up, and then you get to do the big beefy blow. So it up up to you how you see your usual fights going down. They are all pretty much valid your attack bonus. The gunslinger gets by with less on the same crit fishing theory. 3. I will also suggest an odd ball answer: light hammer so you can have a side helping of a throwing build. Damage is about the same as the earth breaker one handed. Fighters have great attack bonus, so they can pull off a switch hitter build fairly well despite being str focused. Returning is a dirt cheap rune to put onto you weapon (a flat 55 gp). Having the option to do ranged stuff doesn't interfere with your main gimmick.
4. There are monk stances that grant an unarmed attack with the Grapple trait, like Gorilla Stance and Clinging Shadows stance. They aren't explicit about what anatomy is used for the Strike. If the GM agrees with the interpretation that that unarmed attack could be done with legs, then grappling with legs would be part of that ruling. I'll note that both of those have narrative outs that make it appropriate. Clinging Shadow stance is a ki spell that makes you have magical smoke coming from you for attacks. It also has the reach trait, so you weren't using your hand anyway. And gorilla stance... well... you are emulating a creature with opposable thumbs on its feet. So it wouldn't surprise me if it had feet grappling techniques.
For fun, I would say yes, but the transformation would mix with their shape changing instincts. So you would turn into a wolf spider The party would have to roll knowledge (nature) checks to even figure out what is wrong with you since they don't realize you turned into a different spider species.
Well, highly consumptive methods will always get someone's attention, adn that actually would be a "disturbing new fad" it if caught on. Using divination probably also ticked off inevitables in other ways. "ruining the course of fate", and all that order stuff, back when prophecies still mattered. Liches... honestly, I am getting more and more skeptical about whether they are ACTUALLY immortal anymore in this setting. They don't grow old or risk death from basic assaults... but I think they rot. Between demi-liches and the new 'hunger for knowledge' mechanics, I think they are seen as just being in a slow state of decay. Heck, I think that might be the view inevitable take on all undead under the current mechanics. On a side note, there is a chance that the inevitable never actually ignore any immortal. But I mean...by definition, you could put every single immortal on a waiting list and say "I will get around to it eventually". If they don't last long enough for you to get to them on the list, then they were never actually a problem to begin with.
1. I think that the Sun Orchid Elixir has been ignored because it is "only just" 3000 years old. When talking about the time scale of immortals that get attention from inevitables, I think that is on the end of "dangerous new internet fad". That is still at the range where some long lived creatures are going around normally. It isn't something you might need to do something about, 'yet', since the problem might take care of itself, given time. I mean, I am still expecting Razmir to try to kick their door in at some point. Someone is going to kill the goose that laid the golden egg. All it takes is one bad catapult or fireball shot at the wrong building when sieging a place for the elixir. The elixir is a temporary fix that only gives some time on the clock. It isn't a permanent solution, and it requires careful cultivation and processing techniques known to maybe one person. That is the kind of thing that is very, very easily lost.
I am sad about that. The Paizo version was a bit unique since they weren't necessarily a ritual someone had to plan for (although they could if they felt like it, if you are a weird druid). Technically, a worm that walks could be a sorcerer that got shanked and left in a ditch. And it just so happened that they had enough will and power to say "No, I aint' going out like that". And you could easily play them as the kind of person that deserves to be shanked and left in a gutter. Instead of just being a lich alternative, they could be a mirror opposite of the lich. They aren't undead, they are disgustingly, writhingly filled with life. They aren't careful planners with a goal that plans contingencies- they are impulsive and willful. Their very existence is a miracle of their own will which protects them from any consequences they might suffer. Who needs caution and consideration? What is the worst that could happen? They could die? Been there, done that. Basically, an accidental Worm that Walks seems like EXACTLY the kind of person that would summon an elder god without think of the consequences. Edit- oh, saw the James Jacobs response. Cool that they are STILL immune to any consequences, even when facing the eldritch gods of "license holders" that wiping out entire civilizations right now. I'm sure we will never hear the end of them bragging about how they survived this.
I'll note that Braggart has some of the best debuff numbers, since your panache skill grants a debuff other than flat footed. So it can lower the enemy's defense more than others, which helps to balance out the risk of not being able to intimidate. Now, every swashbuckler can intimidate (even the gymnast could grab intimidating prowess), and it might be wise to do so if you have an action to spare. But the braggart can do it better, since it is their panache skill. So you could tumble through, and then rely on your panache's bonuses to get more reliable intimidation- maybe even a critical one. The option to either intimidate or tumble through first also means you can pick which save to target first. Target the weaker save, and then get yourself bonuses against the stronger save (it will often be tumble through than intimidation though). This can lead to an all or nothing play style, and make it harder to reliably get a finisher. This is what you do when you want big numbers, rather than safe numbers. Battledancer tends to be more reliable on that front, but that is at the cost of not getting these kinds of numbers.
I like bards with animate dead. Not as great as a wizard or cleric if you want to go with a permanent minion through the undead master archetype. I don't think Bards ahve the same healing options with the occult list. However, when you are summoning undead creatures, the bard can help them punch a bit above their normal weight class through attack buffs or save debuffs.
You could get some pretty consistent combination of archery and blasting if you use flaming sphere. This is an early AoE blasting spell that you can sustained for up to a minute. In return, you bet a burning ball of death rolling around the fight and do a smack of damage. Since it will take an action to sustain, you still have two actions left over. Shoot your bow twice, move and shoot, or just drop a fireball or chain lightning for move blasting when you have the spell slots. You can be flexible.
WEll, if you need a jock for the party, then you can go with Sobek. This is the Egyptian god of "taking your girl, and there is nothing you can do about it, nerd". If you want to understand the mindset of a sobek believer... well, one text comparing the Pharoah Unis to this god ends by stating he is one "who takes women from their husbands to the place [he] likes according to his heart's fancy". So Sobek is about killing monsters and not killing innocent people... but you also take what you want, indulge is pretty much everything, et al. He is a good fit for barbarians.
I'll be direct - if this is your first Pathfinder 2e adventure, I don't recommend a dragon as your first introduction to the game, for yourself or your players. A combat with a dragon has plenty of moving parts and tactical, crunchy bits that could completely devastate a group unfamiliar with the system or overwhelm a GM who hasn't run a PF2 encounter before. A young linnorm. Specifically a young ice lonnorm (which is the same CR 7 creature, it just has ice element flavoring on it). Linnorms are ""dragons"". Big, scaley, often the bane of a random village. They are based more off of snakey dragon tales, rather than the typical winged ones. Functionally, they are not tied up the same "true dragon" package in DnD games that causes some of the problems mentioned above. They usually don't have any notable spells. Adult ones usually just some quality of life spells- true seeing and freedom of movement. Certainly nothing they could just dump into the middle of a fight to ruin everything. The young linnorm doesn't even have a breath weapon. And it has one of those nice general weaknesses- cold iron. The most troublesome thing at this stage is likely their poison, and you can prepare for that. Functionally, this can still work well for the suggested scenario. It is an icy, dragon-ish creature. And these things are well known problems that everyone knows they have to deal with NOW before it gets bigger. It probably onlt takes a half year for it to go from eating livestock to being a CR 17 threat. Linnorms' are also solitary by nature. Their parents likely never even met each other, since they go salmon style. So no fear of an angry mama retaliating. Nope, this is just a singular threat you can- and should take care of now. And you can also adjust the pacing pretty well depending on whether you want things to last longer or to finish up the session. These things have regeneration, and the game notes that this is the most vulnerable time in their lives. So it is completely valid to have the linnorm to run away to eat livestock another day. Or you can have it charge 'bravely' into the barbarian ready to crit when it has had enough.
Because it is actually just a highly technical deception check. It is just that the thaumaturge may or may not be subject to the same deception.
No, no undeath. Or even coming back. An old man just doesn't get up from bed one morning. Peaceful, natural old age, without any back ups or strings attached. But "Razmir" still somehow shows up for the morning sermons. I want the man to die, and the lie itself to live, thrive, and move on without him. The man never lived up to the lie. The truth just held the lie back. In more plain terms- I want the metaphysical manifestation of his lie to succeed where Razmir failed.
Die, and then deny it ever happened.
Before thaumaturgy was released? Lots and lots of lore skills. If you grab skills like lore (undead), you can skip wisdom based skill checks. And the additional lore feat automatically lets you grab legendary rank in those skills just by trading feats. So you can do this without being bound by the limit of three legendary skills. Unfortunately for the ID investigator, thaumaturges can now pull this off without going out of their way. It is still a nice way for wizards to show off how smart they are, since they aren't as bothered with skills and skill feats (assuming you aren't just waiting for unified theory)
PF2e isn't PF1e, in that the bad guys don't have to abide by the same rules as the player. Just create some custom ritual/spells that feel druidic enought and you're set. You don't even need to homebrew all of it's rules (which level it is, what check it ask, how long it last, the effect for failing it, etc), because you can simply assume the druid succeeded the check, that it will last as long as the player don't do something to stop it, and that it's unique so that no player will ever learn it.y if they simply leave or decide to abandon the "burden" of civilization (now that he made it burdensome to live in houses that constantly catch on fire). I think PF1e might have been better for making an existential druid crisis at a reasonable level. Mostly because wild shaping for hours with PF1e's long duration made it far more practical to use strange tactics to bring an ecoterrorist flair to assassins. Besides the basic stealth options (ie- that bluenjay suddenly turned into a guy with a dagger), they can also use and exploit features that most classes can only use in a short duration spell. Like earthglide on elementals. I remember writing up a league of earth elemental druid assassins that relied on hit and run tactics (earth glide and retreat to heal) to do a pressure campaign. While I mostly wanted to use this to tell the party "no, you can't spend 10 minutes every time a problem comes up so the wizard can prepare the exact spell", I would imagine that a siege like that could do quite a number on a small farming village. You can basically reenact the movie "Tremors". Only the graboids can also use flame spheres.
A rogue could also grab twin feint and tumble behind. That way, they either stride-sneak-sneak when they flank, or they tumble-sneak-sneak when they are going it alone. It also works for a two action combo when you ahve to do other things. While this requires a specific build... it is something you can do by level 2. Or level 1 if you are human and just want it over with. This also provides a stable gameplan for melee. It is good as a "hand a new player a level 1 character sheet" build. Sidenote- the rogue isn't face or int ID? Is it str based?
One thing I loved in PF1e was the eldritch guardian. It is mechanically simple- they got a familiar, and they could share their feats with their familiar. Since familiars in that edition had their own set of actions, this meant you could double up on things that were NEVER meant to be done in a single turn. Dirty tricks were a catch all maneuver that let you do things like pull a guy's shirt over his head to blind him, or plug his ears to deafen him. Creative, comic kind of things. That seems powerful, but the enemy could just use their actions to cure the status on their turn. You'd just trade your turn for their turn, like an early level grappler. However, things got silly with Dirty Trick master. This is part of the standard feat path for this maneuver. It lets you hit enemies while they were down and upgrade their status conditions. For example, did your wizard cast a fear spell on the target and just debuff them? Well now you can upgrade that to the stage where they run away in fear. Because of the maneuver's action economy, you normally couldn't set up your own conditions. But with this feat packed familiar? Now you could, since you basically have two fighter running around, both built for this one trick. The worst part is that you could upgrade shaken (a small stat debuff) into "nauseated"- which prevented EVERY ACTION other than a single move action each turn. Which meant that they suddenly couldn't do the one thing that removed dirty trick status conditions. All they can do is crawl around and try not to lose their lunch. You could zip around the field, disabling enemy after enemy for the entire fight. It was the kind of combos that would later make the devs put in the incapacitation rules so bosses wouldn't get one shot so easily. While this build is cheesy, this seemed on brand for the archetype. It is meant to defend against magical threats using your familiar. The best magical defense is making sure the wizard never gets to cast a spell. And wizard would be a high priority target with very poor defense against maneuvers.
One odd advantage of the occult list- it has a "not" summoning spell- animate dead. Animate dead is a summoning spell in all but name. It doesn't even have the evil take, like create undead. Undead present a wide range between simple brutes, casters, and various weirdo effects (incorporeal is one of the ones that immediately come to mind). So they will likely find SOMETHING that might help against enemies immune to mind affect spells. On top of that, they are THE buffer class. So they can also help to make summons that little bit more effective. They can spend a turn effectively with no extra resources just by keeping up their summon, keeping up a song, and maybe some intimidation for extra numbers.
Will half halflings be quarterlings? I think a half orc counts as a one-and-a-halfling. So a half halfling/half orc would be a one-and-a-quarterling.
How about a kobold dragon barbarian? Take the dragon's rage breath feat and kobold breath feat. Now, you have two distinct AoE cones you can spam at least once per fight. Yeah, but everyone I've ever seen has placed burning hands as their "until I can get fireball" spell, even though they are similar in terms of damage. Bursts are valued because you can drop it on the other side of the battlefield. Barbarians are just fine dropping themselves on that end of the battlefield. I think the dragon disciple blast might be slightly less useful since you need a specific resource to use it. It is useful since it does give you the option for three blasts in a fight. The silliest part? Unless I am misreading things, dragon disciple only makes sorcerers match the element of their dragon disciple breath with their bloodline. So you could be a while kobold (ice) with red dragon instinct (fire) that is a disciple to a blue dragon (electricity). And each of these are associated with a resistance too.
How about a kobold dragon barbarian? Take the dragon's rage breath feat and kobold breath feat. Now, you have two distinct AoE cones you can spam at least once per fight. This might feel like it retreads your blast builds. But it presents a distinct change in mindsets. Most blasters avoid cones, since you have to get in close and you have to avoid getting allies caught in the blast. However, cones are great for tanks- you are sturdy enough to not worry about the front line, and since you are in front it is hard for allies to get in your way (At least in the turn or two it takes to blast). You can freely blast with everything you have, and then you don't have to worry about cleaning up since still have powerful melee. You would also have room for chrarisma for intimidation and face skills. You can take the pride of a dragonblooded kobold and sing your own praises to the world.
All four of these actions require the character to make an Athletics roll against the opponent's Reflex DC (for Trip and Disarm) or their Fortitude DC (for Grapple and Shove). The actions have the Attack trait, so they contribute to and suffer from Multiple Attack Penalty. Yeah, that looks like a good gameplan for a bo user. If you take "stand still" at level 4, you get to hit anything that does a move action in your reach. This means:
Since this attack from Stand still isn't affected by multiple attack penalty, you can see your trip a setting up another attack later. So it is not a damage loss. The best part is that it wastes the enemy's time since they have to spend actions to stand up. Similar, if enemies try to run around you to avoid getting smacked in situation 1.), that is also great, since they are wasting time. They are basically kiting themselves while archers and magic users shoot them.
4 bard. Each focuses on a different performance- inspire courage, inspire defense, dirge of doom, et al. No one needs to be melee. They are all grab a summon spell and keep it up as a full caster party. Well, a kind of summon spell. Animate dead is basically a summoning spell in practice, and it technically isn't evil. Anyway, the summons enjoy the benefits of all the performances as well, which lets you get a lot more mileage out of the spell.
Ceramic Plate Another Druid-Friendly armor, this one I wish was +4/Max dex 1 (like chainmail) so we could have druids get good armor with only 12 dex, but sadly not happening. As it stands it is just more expensive hide that always hurts your stealth checks and . . . can be . . . taken off easily? I don't . . . . I don't see the need to take off your armor quickly. It's a really cool character concept, but as it is, doesn't fit into any niche. Would be a must buy for druids though if it was +4/max dex 1 I can see a need to take off armor quickly, but this armor doesn't actually suffer from that situation. Heat metal is a hell of way way for a GM to greet their paladin the session after they get full plate.
Bludgeoning or fire. ...this is not a joke. Fire seems like it would logically have explosions as an option.
Bludgeoning is the type of damage appropriate for one of the most common enemy types in the game- skeletons (and other related undead such as liches). Slashing is good for zombies. In fact, if something is weak to piercing, it is usually weak to slashing too. Piercing... feels off. I am pretty sure it suffered from some ancient attempt at a nerf back in DnD 3.0, or even earlier, which got grandfathered in. A lot of its overall effect has been diluted with paizo's additions to the weapon charts, but the more familiar common weapons still seem to suffer from the effect. Piercing is often the least useful as for resistances and weaknesses. However, it is the damage type on some significant things. It is on long spears, one of the more powerful simple weapons. It is on some of the rogue/bard specific weapons, such as rapiers and short bows. It is on bows in general. I always felt it was an attempt to design in the negative. If a designer wanted full marital weapon proficiency to look attractive, they may have wanted to 'simple weapons' and semi-martial characters look weaker with damage resistance. Back then, the common undead didn't have weaknesses- they had straight damage resistance. A low strength rogue might hit consistent 0's with a rapier or a bow. That is why a lot of the simple weapons from earlier editions were one handed NONFINESEE weapons. They were terrible options that let a rogue or a wizard out of spells at least hit a couple bits of damage.
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