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The Stalker is extremely interesting and appears fun. Mystic Bolt is cool (though, weak). I found nothing compelling in the Zealot or Avenger whatsoever, and even the Warlock feels kind of "eh" because of the weird casting progression/talent tax.

The Stalker is awesome, but has a few talents that kind of don't actually do anything despite sounding really great (for example, the one where you move and drag the guy), and ultimately, has too many talent taxes, because the good talents are necessary to be competitive, but eat up "fun" slots.

An "Extra Talent" feat is necessary. "The Talents are stronger than feats" is no excuse because Magus Arcana, Barbarian Rage Powers, Oracle Revelations, Alchemist's Discoveries, Witch Hexes, even Ninja Talents are stronger than feats, too.

You can't try and balance a class against Fighters, Cavaliers, Monks, and Rogues. I'm not saying you should balance against the full 9-level casters or anything, but at least try to match the general strength of the 4 and 6 level casters. Even though I like the Stalker, it's no where even near the strength of those classes. It's basically just a more interesting Rogue at this point.

Pack flanking is not a combat feat :/

I'm sure it should be, but it isn't (pending ACG errata). So you currently need Combat Expertise and Int 13 as prerequisites.

Uh, Gang Up has identical pre-requisites...?

Further, things like Excalibur and Mjolnir are class features--they're items, technically, but nobody else can use them. They're as close to intrinsic as you can get. Just look at, oh, I don't know, every point buy super hero RPG ever to see how that works in a game.

Summon a monster? Might have worked. He didn't try it. Very little room, and the monster would have been suffocating instantly too, and the monster would have guess which direction to attempt to break through. Either 1 foot into the dungeon or 10 feet through the outer stone wall.

Earth elementals are summonable. They can earthglide and burrow. Would absolutely have worked with no problem. So would having an adamantine arrow or something.

This story basically was:

"This one time, a spell caster was going to perfectly ignore the problems at hand with a common spell, but exactly the right counter spell was waiting, and he rolled badly on a save he's best at while the fighter and another caster rolled really well. This original caster was ill prepared and didn't think about his options at all, so the lucky guys saved him. Thus, casters are fair!"

Is "magic is ok the way it is because magic can stop magic" a serious argument? Is your heart even in this one anymore?

Lemmy wrote:

Ah, the good old "If I don't see the problem, it doesn't exist". I have never gone hungry or homeless, therefore, everyone in the world is well-fed and has a nice home.

And of course, another instance of the great 4th Edition Fallacy... "4e achieved balance through homogenization, therefore all attempts at balance lead to homogenization". Because, obviously the game design used in 4e is the only possible way of balancing an RPG game. There are zero alternatives. ZERO!

And yet you fail to present a counter example.

If it's so easy to balance without homogenizing then where is the example?

Kirthfinder

And yes, 4e made martial and casters balanced, and verily, it wath boring.

I really liked 4e combat and martial/caster balance. I liked every class except Strikers--they were the boring ones, since all they did was damage.

Never have I seen this phenomena where people who are supposed to be on the same team are sniping at one another. It makes absolutely no sense.

Yes, it does make sense. If you and I both want to roleplay a game about being a hero, and I solve every problem and save the day every time while you do almost nothing or have negligible effects on the outcome, do you still feel like a hero because you just happened to be on my team? Why would you ever want to be Xander if you could be Buffy? There were even several episodes when he lamented the same thing! Being the sidekick sucks--being forced into being the sidekick because your chosen flavor of roleplaying (i.e., not being magic) is inherently weaker double sucks.

We've seen 1:1 balance. It was 4th, and it was terrible. Why would anyone be clamoring for that. It was a flop, it drove people from the game, it wasn't any fun. It turned combat into an MMO. It was just... Ugh...

I really liked 4e's combat and class balance and would play it in a second. Now, I wouldn't GM it in a million years because I despise monster design, skill challenges, the lack of actual progression despite number inflation...there were plenty of problems that weren't class balance.

And honestly, in my experience, there were two kinds of people that complained about 4e class balance/homogenization:

1) People that want their spellcasters to run roughshot over the game and were mad that they didn't automatically win all the narrative power by just choosing the right class (in other words, I don't want to cater to jerks like that)

2) People that didn't realize all of the classic, noncombat utility magic still existed in ritual form, because they read the classes, got mad, and stopped going further. The main difference? Literally anyone, fighters included, could do ritual magic and teleport, plane shift, etc. It was a great idea. Maybe, arguably, poor execution, but nobody ever talks about it, they just ignore it.

I mean, for example, an 84 HP Wizard who suffers a full round sneak attack from a Rogue...

Stop there--a wizard who suffers a full attack from any pure martial without spellcaster back up is a terrible wizard who deserves to die. There are so many absurd utilities available that the very notion of being attacked in melee or affected by arrows (windwall, or Fickle Winds, for example) is absurd. You need a caster to beat a caster, even if the martial is the one actually dealing the damage.

Hide in Plain Sight would let you do this, as would Spring Attack, but there's no allowance for it in the rules otherwise, no.

Just take Pack Flanking, if you're a Hunter or Sacred Huntmaster.

Oh, I get it now! Thanks! :)

So...if I was just posing with it I can hold it however I want, but if I fight with it I wanna stab sideways with it? Would that be accurate?

Yeah, generally. It's like a hooking motion.

A long time, I watched a video online of a shotel duel (not to the death or anything, I guess it was more like fencing or a demonstration), and it was pretty bizarre. These guys were jumping and rolling around trying to get the proper angle to hook around the other guy's shield without leaving his own side exposed to a hook-stab. But this game Dark Souls apparently has a Shotel in it and so the only videos I can find for dozens of youtube pages are of this game I never heard of before.

On a slightly related note, if I were building a character using this weapon, I'd probably want to focus on DEX, it sounds like you gotta be precise and agile if you wanna be effective with it, rather than hacking or stabbing with brute strength?

You'd think that, but the Shotel in Pathfinder is not finesseable unless you're a Swashbuckler (but even then, you can't get Dex to damage), so, unfortunately, you need Strength. Honestly, it's a terrible weapon, mechanically. Unless you're going to be fighting people with shields almost exclusively, it's not worth the exotic proficiency required to wield it (and even then, it's iffy). It's a d8, x3 piercing one-hander with the utterly useless Performance quality (seriously, does anyone ever use this?) and a +1 to hit against shields. Lame.

What are they, then?

They look more like Khopeshes to me, personally.

Vivid description! So by inside curve do you mean the guy in the first pic is holding it wrong?

I mean that neither guy is holding it right because while the inside curve would face you, you'd mostly be holding it sideways. Like, do you know the way people who don't know how guns work hold pistols sideways because they think it looks cool? That's what I mean. The flat of the blade would be parallel to the ground, not perpendicular.

This is hard to describe. Ok, take your right fist and stick your thumb up. Then, turn your hand so that your thumb is pointing to your left. Picture a guy standing in front of you and try to swing your arm so that your thumb jams them in the ribs or the side of the head. That's the motion you're using to stab someone with a shotel. You can't really swing it like a normal sword--it doesn't thrust, it doesn't slash, it doesn't hack--you kind of have to hook it. It's actually really only good for hooking, which is normally very awkward. But if someone has a shield, it's just about the ideal move--their shield is almost useless against such a move.

Crusader's Flurry with a deity that favors rapiers could work, but the actual best way to do this is to visual your "hits" as the aggregate result of several rapid strikes.

Let me describe my sort of campaign and see if you have any ideas of what I should play or test out. I am not opposed to combining systems. I am decent at introducing house rules that are within reason...

5e will work very well for you, but you might also want to consider just doing E8. I am currently running Pathfinder E8 (I guess we call that P8?) and it's going wonderfully. It pretty much solves all the problems you've described as well.

Neither one of those weapons are shotels.

Shotels are double edged, but not used for slashing for the most part. They are piercing weapons--the massive curve was designed to stab around shields. You'd mostly hold it with the inside of the curve facing you, so you could stab forward at an angle to jab someone in the kidneys around their shield arm.

No, it would cost 9000 (Medium Fortification) + 1500 (Full Plate) + 150 (Masterwork) for 10,650gp.

You don't pay for pluses anymore. Specific weapons and armor are special because they don't work with plus-equivalents, their abilities are flat costs on top of the pluses.

Why not just use a 9-Ring Broadsword or Temple Sword with slashing grace? Unchained Monk is proficient with both. As a Human you can have the feats together by level 3 and you only need to dip 1 level of monk.

Neither of those weapons are finesseable. Slashing Grace only gives you Dex to damage, so, you'd have to dip 1 level of Swashbuckler or Daring Champion Cavalier, too, in order to get Dex to hit.

I feel like Detonate already has this covered.

You could ditch Dex (sort of), and take Sensei instead of Unchained Monk. They get Wisdom to hit with unarmed strikes. It's not to damage, but, it's a lot "cheaper" character resource-wise.

My second choice would be a Sarenrae worshipping Sacred Fist 4/Inquisitor X, with Dervish Dance and Crusader's Flurry.

One of the problems I have had in PF is the difficulty of having characters of differing level. If someone is 4th or 5th and the rest of the party is 7th, you can definitely tell. Through some of your comments, it seems that 5e would shorten this gap considerably. Am I correct?

Please, don't do that. It's horrible for lower level characters to group with more powerful ones. Why inflict that on people?

So, I am not even going to try and parse the text here. What I can do, however, is say that SKR doesn't even work for Paizo anymore, and the current Development Team has a track record of opposing your reading.

I can say with probably 95% confidence that the RAI of Precise Strike is that the bonus damage applies only if you make attacks with a single weapon and don't carry a shield other than a buckler. The phrase "free hand" was poorly chosen, but yeah, disallowing twf and/or additional natural attacks is almost certainly what they intend.

So cutting right to the chase, as a DM I'm trying to make weak monsters (HD and AC weak) as viable threats later on in a campaign I'm going to be running

This doesn't work in Pathfinder. You pretty much need a different game built for this, like 5e to pull it off.

2) Class levels. No reason these little buggers, who are little more than Goblins mixed with Morlocks without the Swarming ability, should be able to pull off complex teamwork feats and such.

So, uh, don't give them complex teamwork feats? You get to pick the class levels and feats you give them as the GM, obviously.

1) Low HD. The players should be one-shotting these monsters by ~lvl 5-7. ~12-16 hp each.

12-16 damage is one-shottable straight up at level 1. Full BAB + 18 Str + Power Attack + Greatsword is 2d6+9 damage, averaging 15 damage at 1st level.

3) High or scaling BAB. Yes, you may have like 26 AC and the thing these creatures are based off of (Goblins most likely) only have about a +1 or +2 to hit, but yes, they hit you.

This just isn't going to work. You're best bet might be if you gave them the "helpful" trait or some similar aid another bonus and then have them attack in swarms. So, maybe the first three all aid another the fourth, giving it a +12 to hit you.

4) Possibly scaling damage. Not by much though, replace weapons with claw attacks for small size creatures.

And yet, you don't want class levels or feats, which could easily give you scaling damage via things like Sneak Attack and Precise Strike.

So anyway I brought the idea to one of the players who has a good grasp of the rules and he more or less suggested no on the BAB and damage scaling, insisting on the class levels or a more "mooks led by monsters with class levels". "Not really what I was going for" was my reply, to which he responded with "Well that's what the system is designed for" or something of that nature.

So I'm askin' ya'll, what are your thoughts on this?

I think your friend is right. You're way better off with 5e, but you can maybe kind of sort of make it maybe work with some kind of aid another chaining. I guess.

And just to be nitpicky, summoners get 3rd level spells at 7th, just like every other 2/3 caster.

You don't provoke an AoO for drawing a weapon. Just spend a move action and do it. Problem solved.

Alternatively, just 5' step back so you can hit him with your polearm.

The level 12 non-mythic Hunter archer in my current party could kill this thing herself in two turns. 30 AC with only 160 HP is going to be very short work.

If you have a full BAB guy who intelligently took Mythic Vital Strike with his mythic feat, he'll be looking at, probably +22ish? to hit, and he'll be attacking three times per round (normal standard, mythic power for a bonus standard, swift action to use a champion/trickster bonus attack thingy) for something like 4d6+50 or so damage each. Those save DCs are really low (DC 17? Really?), so, I don't think things are looking so good for your construct.

It wasn't originally how Masterpieces worked. Or at least, it was never clarified that way, and people, like myself, assumed the development team actually wanted Bards to use Masterpieces. My group and I decided that Masterpieces were something separate from Bardic Music, so you could have one Masterpiece and Performance up at the same time. It was a lot more fun to play that way. But no performance is, in combat, better than Inspire Courage, except maybe AoE Freedom of Movement or the one that blinds evil targets.

With the new rulings, you're basically stuck with just the long duration utility effects, like Triple Time, Pageant of the Peacock (which is ridiculous), or Legato Piece on the Infernal Bargain.

Yeah, unfortunately, with the ridiculous nerf/retcon, Virtuoso Performance is the first opportunity available. Shadowbard at 13th is even better, but yeah, there's nothing at lower levels.

Apparently, they decided nobody should ever use Masterpieces in combat because none of them are even remotely as strong as Inspire Courage. I guess you can still get use from some utility effects, like Pageant of the Peacock (which is beyond insane and should be banned--I say this as one who used it for several levels before I felt too bad about how insanely powerful it was), Triple Time, or Legato Piece on the Infernal Bargain for planar allies.

mplindustries wrote:

Letric wrote:

but honestly, who can remember all the rules about Pathfinder?

Uh, er, me? Pretty much everyone I've ever enjoyed having as a GM? You need to know the rules of the game--it's practically required to run things.

I call BS.

Excluding the Bestiaries, Monster Codex,l and NPC Codex (as well as the Strategy Guide, which adds no new rules), Pathfinder is 3,466 pages. The Bestiaries and Codices add another 1,852 pages, for a total of 5,318 pages.

** spoiler omitted **

How many of those pages are rules? Stat blocks aren't rules. Magic item descriptions aren't rules. Fluffy text about "how to GM" isn't rules. It's easier than you think.

mplindustries wrote:

Letric wrote:

I feel like PF and games like such, put way too much weight on how a character does something at a rule level, instead of just saying "I freaking hit the enemy with a barrel, and that is my ability".

Stop playing D&D derivative games. 90% of non-D&D games work more like this. Really, only D&D style games even use levels.

Letric wrote:

On the other hand, class are the problem. Class is a restrictive way of thinking.

I think level is more of a problem, but yeah, very, very few RPGs other than D&D clones have hard-classes, either (though most feature a "soft" class system that gives you some sub-package of abilities or makes you better at some task everyone can do).

And these have me doubting that you have much RPG experience outside of "D&D derivative games". There are SOME games that don't use levels or classes, but you sound like you're trying to say that they are rare outside of D&D. They aren't.

Yes, they are rare outside of D&D. The only RPG I can think of with levels that isn't d&d derivative is RIFTS, and that's got palladium's house system which started with a d&d derivative fantasy game. We're not counting stuff like tunnels and trolls or MERP as being not d&d derivative, right?

Classes are more difficult because you can make an argument for things like vampire clans in masquerade/requiem being classes, though I would call them very "soft" classes. The only things I can think of approaching a hard class system like in d&d are RIFTS again, Feng Shui, The One Ring, Warhammer (which is pretty d&d derivative anyway) uh maybe Legend of the Five Rings, sort of could be argued to have class and level (school and rank)...

Edit: oh, the Dragon Age rpg as both, too

But seriously, the vast, vast majority of non-d&d derivative games have no classes or levels and generally rely on just spending xp directly on increasing stats/skills or gain abilities. I feel silly doing this, but a short list of the first bunch of rpgs I know that have neither:
World of Darkness/Exalted/Trinity, Savage Worlds, Shadowrun, Legend of the Five Rings, A Song of Ice and Fire Roleplaying, Mechwarrior, FATE, FUDGE, Castle Falkenstein, Dogs in the Vineyard, The Queen's Cavaliers, BRP (like runequest or call of cthulhu), Traveller, d6, Children of the Sun, Godlike/Wild Talents/Reign/ORE, Burning Wheel, FASERIP, Tri-Stat, Starchildren, Artesia, FUSION, Chtulhutech, GURPS, HERO, jeez, I could keep going for hours. Class/level is a d&d thing. It doesn't show up much in modern rpg design, and was hardly universal even in its heyday.

I don't understand why the focus has to be on the system. Yes, having a complete system with rules is nice, but honestly, who can remember all the rules about Pathfinder?

Uh, er, me? Pretty much everyone I've ever enjoyed having as a GM? You need to know the rules of the game--it's practically required to run things.

I feel like PF and games like such, put way too much weight on how a character does something at a rule level, instead of just saying "I freaking hit the enemy with a barrel, and that is my ability".

Stop playing D&D derivative games. 90% of non-D&D games work more like this. Really, only D&D style games even use levels.

On the other hand, class are the problem. Class is a restrictive way of thinking.

I think level is more of a problem, but yeah, very, very few RPGs other than D&D clones have hard-classes, either (though most feature a "soft" class system that gives you some sub-package of abilities or makes you better at some task everyone can do).

How about treating it as aid another?

Each character pulling the rope makes a DC10 strenght check, and each success adds 2 to the tied character's swim check. Simple enough, and would work well enough for the situation you're describing.

The problem with aid another, which I did consider, is that it puts the action burden on the one being pulled.

See, when you are holding your breath, taking any action beyond a move action causes you to lose a second round worth of breath. So, if you have 10 Con, taking only move actions, you can stay under water safely for 20 rounds if you never take more than a move, but only 10 rounds if you do. That means normal characters with a 30' base speed can go 140' over 1 minute, or 150' over 30' seconds and be ok. If someone can pull you at, say, 15' per turn, you'd be totally safe for 300' of travel, since you could just take no action and hold your breath for the full 20 rounds while they did the work.

The problem here is that the party has to go 250' feet under the water, which requires 17 full round actions (well, they don't have to go here, they just want to--I run sandboxes). You would need 17 Con for that to be totally safe, which nobody in the party has. They do, however, all have air-bladders, which means the trip is a cinch for the guys who can't fail the swim checks and have 14-16 Con each.

It is significantly harder for the Bard who will fail ~1/3 of the rolls or so and only has 12 Con. So, ok, she can fail 7 rolls before she's in the danger zone, but that's still not great odds, since the probability suggests she'll fail 6 before making 17. One extra slip and she'll die. So, I might also need to know pure pull speeds, with an unconscious person on the other end for the last few feet, for example.

I'm also not really looking forward to rolling out 20+ swim checks just to see if a PC dies or not. So, ideally, I'd like them to feel how risky it all is, but ultimately have a fair answer to the question that also keeps them alive without having to really go through the rolls.

mplindustries wrote:

Snorb wrote:

MPL: The fighter is most definitely not useless, as my fifth-level "can attack twice in a round, or four times in a round once per encounter" wood elf archer fighter can attest to. =p

I hate to do this here, but the Warlock shooting two Eldritch Blasts every round for the same (or is it more?) damage plus an unresistable knockback and then can also throw around powerful spells a few times per encounter if they like begs to differ. And don't get me started on trying to compete with Ranger archers...

I don't think "useless" was what I was intending though. It's less useless and more obsolete. The Fighter doesn't really bring anything to the table that's worth having over other classes. They're good--probably better in context than a Pathfinder Fighter is, but there's never a time when, mechanically speaking, Fighter is the best choice. Which is a shame, because Fighters were easily one of the strongest classes in 4e.

Unless magic is brought to the levels of Lord of the Rings books, it will always be better.

I always wanted to make a Character that uses Trip/Disarm and the like, but it's impossible.

The easy answers, that will never happen in D&D (again) are:

1) Give martials and magic users the exact same abilities and just say they are different sources, like "I can stun you because I'm awesome at swinging hammers" vs. "I can stun you because I invade your mind with magic." But this won't happen because 4e did it and failed, and everyone assumes nothing like it will ever work again instead of realizing it might have failed for other reasons.

2) Give everyone magic--i.e., make it something anyone can do, exactly like fighting, feats, or skills, and just make wizards the best at it, just the way fighters are (supposed to be) the best at feats (Rangers and Monks are better because they ignore pre-reqs) and rogues are (supposed to be) the best at having skills (Bards and Rangers are better).

3) Make the magic with extreme narrative power into rituals everyone can do with proper training, while the "quick and dirty" stuff is still the realm of wizards et all.

4) Give pure martial type characters like fighters nigh immunity to magic, so, magic is what you use against massed mooks, but Conan types can just punch through your enchantments.

5) Make magic hard, so you can actually fail at doing it. This goes really well with #2.

But this is getting way off track. 5e is a good game. Pathfinder is a good game. Neither game is great. 5e is better for playing, Pathfinder is better for building.

MPL: The fighter is most definitely not useless, as my fifth-level "can attack twice in a round, or four times in a round once per encounter" wood elf archer fighter can attest to. =p

I hate to do this here, but the Warlock shooting two Eldritch Blasts every round for the same (or is it more?) damage plus an unresistable knockback and then can also throw around powerful spells a few times per encounter if they like begs to differ. And don't get me started on trying to compete with Ranger archers...

I don't think "useless" was what I was intending though. It's less useless and more obsolete. The Fighter doesn't really bring anything to the table that's worth having over other classes. They're good--probably better in context than a Pathfinder Fighter is, but there's never a time when, mechanically speaking, Fighter is the best choice. Which is a shame, because Fighters were easily one of the strongest classes in 4e.

There is actually a note on pulling someone up a cliff under the climb skill write up.

It is double your max load if the one character is just pulling someone or something up a cliff.

Not sure how that would affect someone pulling through water though.

I get that it's double your max load--I'm not too concerned about the weights here because it's two very strong characters pulling a smaller one--but at what speed can they do this?

The specific situation I am envisioning, though it's by no means the only way they'll do it, is that the party is facing an underwater tunnel. The two stronger characters can easily swim through to the other side, I know. The Dervish Dancing Bard? Not so much. I think she'll drown trying it, and I suspect they'll know this. So, I foresee the strong ones swimming first, trailing a rope tied to her. When they get to dry land, a tug or two will tell her to dive in, and they can pull her through, I assume, faster than she could feebly swim.

The water is only DC: 10, but it's a long passageway and the two stronger ones can hold their breath much longer than needed and also can't fail the Swim check. The Bard can definitely fail, and her Con is lower, too, so, if she fails more than maybe three or four times during the course of a fairly long swim, she'll die.

The best parts of 5e:

1) "Bounded Accuracy" where in numbers only go so high. It means that everything is always a threat. Level 1 monsters can still work against level 11 PCs.

2) Every class is awesome and useful except the Fighter (which is an improvement over "every class is awesome and useful except the ones without magic").

3) Powerful magic is extremely limited. Specifically, there are vastly fewer spell slots per day across the board and the Concentration mechanic means spellcasters usually have to choose between powerful buffs (and which powerful buff) and powerful CC effects--they also can't just take hits in the face like it's nothing because they might lose the ongoing spell.

4) More "mundane magic" is significantly more powerful and useful. Specifically, those 3+stat/per damage abilities and 1d3 damage cantrips Pathfinder classes get that are a joke after the first 3-4 levels become actually powerful bread and butter attack spells that casters can rely on rather than shooting a crossbow or wasting their turns. They can contribute meaningfully without blowing their extremely limited powerful spells for the day.

5) The idea of each stat being a save is brilliant.

The biggest downsides:

1) I still don't like 5e's monster design and feel like it's totally backwards (just like 4e--ew, worst part of that game, in my mind).

2) Powerful magic still exists, and some of it is really stupidly powerful. They tried to limit it, but it's still "I swing a sword!" vs. "I reshape reality!" Summoning is especially BS.

3) The idea of each stat being a save is brilliant, but it is executed horrendously to the degree that you essentially still have Fort, Ref, and Will, then randomly you might roll Str to avoid a magic grapple, Int to escape Maze, or Cha when there's some alingment effect, instead of, you know, actually utilizing the stats for what they should do (the very idea that Charisma doesn't defend against charms, Con is usually used for forced movement, and Int counters illusions rather than Wis is beyond absurd to me).

4) There are very, very few customization options. I can't decide, yet, if this is because the game is designed to be simpler with fewer decision points, or because it's just super new and doesn't have a lot of options available. Either way, going from Pathfinder, you leave a game with 30+ classes (with at least a half dozen archetypes each--usually more), a couple dozen races (each with multiple optional abilities), hundreds of feats, and thousands of spells to a game with, I believe a dozen classes (with two archetypes each, except for cleric/wizard that I think get 8), less than 10 races (with two options each), less than 20 feats, and maybe 100 spells or so. There's just so much less there for a player that wants to build and tweak characters. I think there's a lot more for players that don't care about that and just want to get down to play, but, well, I'm not one of those :(

As far as I know, there are no rules for this, so, I am asking for some other opinions on what rules to adapt and apply to it, because I can easily foresee this being very important in the next session of the game I am running.

Imagine this:
Two strong characters are on dry land holding a long rope tied to a third character. The third dives underwater. How quickly (how many feet per round) can the two pull the diver back up to the surface?

To further complicate this, what if the diver is not dead weight? What if they actively swim towards the pullers? Could you really just combine the two speeds or is it impossible to swim while getting dragged? What if you can't swim at all? Can you still help by pulling yourself along the rope you're tied to?

And how about a useful extrapolation not as immediately relevant to me, but still useful to know:

What if someone is at the bottom of a cliff tied to your rope. How quickly can somebody pull them up the cliff (could be relevant if there are pursuers)? Again, what if the person is actively climbing the rope you're pulling?

Even for those who might take issue with magical items being a valid rebuttal, why not brush up on your folklore and mythology? Gilgamesh, Heracles, Beowulf, Ali Baba, Robin Hood, Pecos Bill, Conan, Bilbo, Wolverine, The Tick...not knowing magic doesn't stop them from achieving great deeds, even when they fight enemies and/or fight alongside allies who do.

Gilgamesh physically fought concepts (Humbaba). The 12 labors of Heracles included several non-combat problems he was able to solve with his super strength, such as rerouting a river. Beowulf was also a supreme swimmer, able to fend off sea serpents while in a race or something. Conan probably had 20 in every stat, because he does stuff like totally shrug off enchantment spells thrown at him before ripping arms off evil sorcerers--at the very least he had all good saves. Wolverine has super regeneration. Bilbo contributed mostly non-combat stuff to a world without any real non-deity spellcasters that capped at 6th level at most. The Tick is a comedy super hero. The others all lived (or supposedly lived) in the real world, and so, like everyone here, were limited to real world stuff, and also contributed mostly out of combat stuff with an absolute cap of maybe 6th level tops.

So, uh, the last half of those guys basically don't count because martials are perfectly fine for the first 5-6 levels, easy. The first half, well--where's my Fighter's ability to chop up concepts? Why can't my Fighter reroute a river? You can't win this. It doesn't work. Martials do something everyone can do (fight/have feats/have skills) better. Spellcasters do something not everyone else can do (cast spells). There's no contest.

You can cast more spells per day with a higher casting stat, but you never know more based on a stat.

Hunters make the very best mounted characters thanks to teamwork feat sharing. You don't need to make the pet actually medium, just give it the Narrow Frame feat and it can squeeze to medium at no penalty.

Consider natural attacks like claws, gore, bite do not list Str as part of their damage normally, why should the hair attack call it out? It should instead call it out if you don't get it.

It did get called out, by stating that you add Intelligence to the damage. You do not add Strength AND Intelligence by default--I'm not aware of any attack that adds two stats in Pathfinder. There is an unwritten, but heavily implied rule that you only add one stat to your damage, so, by listing a stat, it is obviously implied that no other stat applies.

Uh, a reach weapon is the simple answer. Hit him from 10' away and he doesn't threaten you and therefore can't trip you.

When you hit him, back away so he has to provoke to move closer and can't full attack. When he provokes, trip him.

It is a sorcerer spell of 4th level or lower though. Which is what the text in the spell calls for (right in your quote there even).

Ok, so, can my Wizard use Shadow Evocation to create deeper darkness because this one sorcerer bloodline gets it as a 3rd level spell? It is a sorcerer spell of 4th level or lower...sort of.

Summon Ancestral Guardians and Trial of Fire and Acid are pretty ridiculous spells for a Lesser Dazing Rod to affect.

This was a Flowing Monk. They can trip or reposition in response to being attacked. Whenever I use Flowing Monks as enemies, I also give them Vicious Stomp, so, it's even more dangerous.

Still, the real problem might be your level 3 Paladin's 16 CMD. That's pretty low--either you have a negative Dex or you don't have an 18 Strength, and neither one is good.

Was it something said by Boris Karloff?

It's from How the Grinch Stole Christmas as far as I know.

I don't think that's a relevant FAQ. You can't dual wield, i.e., make extra attacks with, spiked armor and a two-handed weapon, but you can definitely use both at the same time if you're not making bonus attacks.

Unless they say something more directly, you can threaten both at 5' and 10' with armor spikes and a reach weapon.

No, it definitely wouldn't add both. It should only add Intelligence. Agile wouldn't do anything for the white-witch's hair.

Hero Labs is not official--it is just one guy's interpretation of how stuff works. There are plenty of mistakes.

The Flickmace is an exotic one handed reach weapon in its current explanation-text-free incarnation.

Supposedly, it was intended to have two "modes:" one was a one-handed reach weapon and the other was as a normal heavy mace; you could switch between them as a swift action, kind of like a smaller Dorn Dergar. The weapon was intended to be cut completely, but it was left on the table, even though the explanation text was removed.

Ugh, I was going to make an argument here and...in the process, I changed my own mind.

Ok, so, you need two things to stealth:
1) You can't be observed
2) You need cover or concealment

When you have full cover or total concealment, you are also not observed because both, by definition, block line of sight. So, you automatically fulfill both requirements.

However, while using just regular cover or just concealment, you are still normally visible. If you were stealthed at the beginning of the turn, you are not observed and you can use this sort of cover/concealment to fulfill the requirements of stealth. But if you did not start your turn in stealth, you are observed, and therefore, cannot use normal cover/concealment to break line of sight and make a stealth check.

Frustratingly, I now believe that the point of Hide in Plain Sight is to, essentially, allow you to act as though regular cover and concealment can "break line of sight" so you can stealth even though a normal character would be observed.

Examples:

Bob, Mary, and Badguy are in the woods. There are big, thick trees that provide total cover, shrubbery that provides concealment, and large rocks that provide cover.

Bob does not have HiPS. Mary does. Both have potions of invisibility and blur.

If Bob starts his turn in plain sight, and runs behind a rock or shrubbery, he gets cover or concealment, but he cannot make a stealth check. If he runs behind a tree, he breaks los and has cover, so, he can stealth.

If he starts his turn behind a tree, he can roll stealth to leave his total cover as long as he ends his turn behind another tree, in some shrubbery, or behind a rock. If his stealth check fails, he needs to run behind another tree or take the potion of invisibility to stealth again.

If he start his turn in plain sight and then drinks the blur potion, he, once again, cannot stealth. However, if he ran behind the tree as above, he could stealth. If he then drank the blur potion, he could sneak out with stealth rolls and will always end his turn with concealment, thus allowing continued stealth until he does something to attract attention.

If Mary starts her turn in the open, she cannot stealth. But, if she moves behind a tree, a shrubbery, or a rock, or if she drinks a potion of blur or invisibility, she can stealth. She can continue to make stealth checks as long as she ends her turn with cover or concealment, regardless of whether or not she began her turn stealthed.

And, yeah, that is how I see it now, so I change my answer. No, in the blank room, the HiPS rogue could not hide, but he could if he had a Blur effect.