xevious573's page

When it comes to the feat, I only wish it was a bit lower level so I could use it on my telekinetic rend focused Psychic. A Wizard multiclassed/free archetyped with psychic could make slightly inefficient use of telekinetic rend with this feat but not the other way around. But I think it's still a good feat.

Hi! I recently put in an order for the Orange and Yellow starfinder pawn bases (one of each size and color). Unfortunately, it appears I have received 2 yellow medium, 2 yellow large, and 2 yellow huge pawn base sets and no orange pawn base sets of any size. Probably an honest mistake but I would still be interested in acquiring the orange pawn bases. Can you let me know how I might be able get those? Thanks!

PS. Red Large Pawn Bases and Blue Medium Pawn Bases were sold out when I made my order. Might you have any idea on if you'll be restocking those and what the time frame on those might be if you are planning on restocking them? Thanks again!

I'll note that not leveling up cleanly at 20 means that they do get a +1 at 15. That isn't as silly as it sounds, because it won't be a problem until level 20 exactly, a small portion of the Eidolon's game time.

If you stagger not increasing STR, DEX, CON, and WIS, it's possible to get the following stat arrays for the eidolon's presented (assuming you ignore INT):

Angel or Beast
STR 20, DEX 20, CON 20, INT 8, WIS 18, CHA 18

Devotion Phantom or Dragon:
STR 20, DEX 20, CON 20, INT 10, WIS 18, CHA 16

OR

STR 20, DEX 20, CON 20, INT 10, WIS 16, CHA 18

OR

STR 20, DEX 20, CON 18, INT 10, WIS 18, CHA 18

There doesn't seem to be much reason, besides Dual Studies, to boost Intelligence. Charisma isn't used by the Eidolon for Spell Casting since it uses your Spell DC and Attack Modifier but could still let it use social skills. The level 20 feat, Eidolon's Avatar, appears to let your Eidolon make friends and have it benefit you should you use the Commune ritual, so having your Eidolon be good at making friends could potentially benefit you, if your GM is so kind. The only downsides to this is that only one of the stats will reach 20 (or 18) by level 15 and the rest will hit their cap at level 20.

Hi! In order #29227225, I have two subscriptions set to ship: Starfinder Adventure Path and Starfinder Rulebook. In order #27228782 (which is more recent), I have started the Pathfinder Rulebook subscription and Pathfinder Pawns subscription and also ordered some pawn bases to go along with those. I put those items in the sidecart and I am hoping that those items will ship with order #29227225 if possible. Thank you for your assistance.

Nanomachines and Mechs, for that true Metal Gear Solid feel. I can dig it, just don't forget to let me hook up nukes to my giant bipedal tanks. ;)

Page 456 and the Glossodex both state that you are no longer your own ally. Which is something I personally didn't realize but am glad I now know =)

Back to the topic at hand. I like lay on hands. It's a good spell and the fact you can 10-minute repeat it outside a fight is awesome. It's kinda a weird complaint you have going here, considering most other martial classes don't have any sort of self-healing ability and somehow they all have to survive as well. They also tend to have slightly weaker defenses. You making it out to seem like you won't survive without more healing while have good hp and the best AC/Fortitude in the game is a pretty weird complaint when there will be allies who can heal you up both in the fight and outside the fight.

You can't teleport between starships or between planets. It's a bit of a stretch to say you can teleport to a specific point in the atmosphere since there isn't really good notable features to focus one's mind on.

Instead, I imagine she most likely decided to dimension door a distance away from the starship since you can just state direction and distance with dimension door. She also could of simply broke the transparent aluminum (Hardness 10, HP 15) window and survived the explosive decompression event. In terms of rules closeness, DD seems pretty likely. The only rules quibble I have about this story is the jetpack. It would take 10 minutes to install into armor. Explosive decompression would rip such an object out of her arms but I suppose dimension dooring into the void of space while in a life bubble could avoid that. Either way, the story kinda makes it seem like she doesn't have that type of time available.

EDIT: Should be noted that I do actually like the story, I just also enjoy seeing the rules play out in the fiction.

The second line of sensed says "You know what space the sensed creature occupies, but little else." Since you know what square the target occupies, presumably you can just put the target in the AoE's area. Remember with AoE's you "target" a intersection of lines, a point on the map and then you count the distance from that point as per normal distance (refer to the AoE diagrams in the rulebook if necessary). You don't target the creatures inside the AoE however.

You could... cast the cantrip and also shoot the bow? Especially if the cantrip doesn't require an attack roll. This quite likely to be more effective then shooting the bow three times >.>

I don't mind the idea of SLIGHTLY buffed cantrips. Honestly I would prefer MORE spell slots to help prevent a caster from being forced to do cantrip spam when they have less then useful spells

This is somewhat tangential but I feel I must say it.

I'm not sure I actually care all that much for Cantrip reliance. It kinda reminds me of 4th Ed D&D At-Will powers. At-Will Powers WEREN'T exciting. You could only say "I cleave!" Or "I cast magic missile!" before it kinda means very little. At the same time, 4th Editions daily powers suffered from the usual problems Vancian casters suffer from (though perhaps more extreme). Players were hesitant to use them in all but the most dire situations which caused players to just overwhelm boss encounters by unleashing all their stored up Daily abilities at once.

No, I think the best aspect of the 4th Edition system of combat was in Encounter powers. Encounter powers gave renewable and exciting abilities that asked the players "When is the best time to use this power?" each fight rather then over the course of an uncertain day. For At-Will powers the answer to that question was "When I have nothing else I can do or my daily/encounter abilities can't be of maximal use" and for daily powers the answer was "Boss fights or when someone is gonna die".

I am not advocating for a complete switch to such a system. I could just play 4e if I wanted to. But I would like to make the suggestion that perhaps introducing "encounter powers" to spell casters might be a different solution to the request for cantrips to be buffed. Maybe the idea of domains or wizard specializations could move towards that direction or maybe there could be an "Encounter Slot" at certain spell levels. I'm kinda just spitballing here but it wasn't really all that exciting constantly saying "I cast telekinetic projectile" every round as my goblin bard I played (especially since these cantrips heavily limited the rest of your tactical options).

Just my ¢2.

There is a saying in my own personal groups and in my own play experience about how creatures are "Meat Cubes". In truth, the rules are on 3-dimensional combat have always been lacking. Creatures' size dimensions are only given for a 2D grid and yet flight and reverse gravity exist and often turn combat from a 2-dimensional affair into a 3-dimensional affair.

I believe most groups dealt with this by just assuming that creatures were "Meat Cubes" or "Meat Cubic Rectangles" as appropriate for the creature and just used the normal rules for determining reach and distances of effects by measuring from the corners and edges of the "meat cube". Perhaps using a separate sheet of 1" graph paper (8"x11" size sheet) that you can flip on to its edge to form a z-axis grid or through the use of plastic height platforms.

Obviously everything I just typed up makes 3D combat a weird and complicated mess to such a degree that it was largely left up to each GM and group to figure out how they were going to deal with 3D combat on their own.

But I don't think this is ideal and I would prefer if the combat chapter, spellcasting chapter, and monster statblocks gave the necessary information for 3D combat so as to not leave GMs without a framework to handle these situations.

For the character sheet could I make a recommendation. Change the Spell Roll and DCs box so it looks like this instead:

DC = 10 + Spell Roll = Ability + Prof + Item

One of my players complained that the current way is kinda counter-intuitive but putting the order like this could also help get across the idea of Perception DC, Fortitude DC, etc.

Just a thought.

xevious573 wrote:

I realize this might be an annoying request but would you consider adding in the Monk style types to the table?

I think most of them are already there. Dragon style is the same as a "Greatclub: d10, Backswing" for example.

Most styles are indeed covered by another option. But Tiger and Wolf Style are d8 with Agile and Wolf style also has a situational Forceful trait. There are no Agile d8 weapons in the weapons table that he made and Curved Blade/1d8 only covers the 1st strike of Wolf Jaw Strike if flanking.

I realize this might be an annoying request but would you consider adding in the Monk style types to the table?

So, wait a sec, do we have to spend some of our "feats" that we get as we level up our characters to get these "racial feats" or do we start off with one or two "racial feats" from the get go?

Start with 1 at character creation and then get 4 more (we think) feat slots dedicated to Ancestry feats as well level up.

PossibleCabbage wrote:

Isn't the blog clear that you can only take Heritage feats at level 1?

Yes it is. That is irrelevant to what I asked though, since I was saying I don't want to have to take non-heritage feats at all, hoping that you aren't forced to take them after first level.

Well you are allotted a certain number of Ancestry Feat slots as you gain levels. So in a way yes you are forced to take more Ancestry feats that won't be able to be Heritage feats.

I realize that the Core rules are going to be more "Golarion" infused but I personally think it's quite probable that many of the non-heritage options will be generic enough that they will be suitable for most fantasy campaigns.

Oh boy, yet another solution in search of a problem.

The more I see, the more I am not looking forward to PF2.

I had a problem with PF1E... Attacks being All or Nothing was on that list. And yes, "All" is the correct terms considering the majority of damage for most characters came from flat modifiers which could get really high and not from the dice roll.

Success/Failure gradation is a good thing. And I think this particular system has elegantly added a lot of potential to this game.

After dice but before results are revealed means you get to see if the enemy rolled high or low, but the GM is not obligated to give you the mod on it. Hundred times more reliable than just blindly hoping for the best.

Wait...??? You always get to see the enemy's attack roll??? Oh boy am I wrong! I thought one of the primary purposes of the GM Screen was to hide die rolls from the players! Boy, was I mistaken! I will alert my GM forthwith that they should do their die rolls in the open!

...

Considering my GMs tend to hide their die rolls most of the time, typically only rolling them out in the open for the most dramatic of rolls, I'm gonna say, in regards to nimble dodge and others like it, this comment is most likely incorrect. You are still almost certainly praying you choose correctly.

But it is true that you get to see your own die roll before choosing to use a reroll ability of your... Though Paizo does have this tendency to not address natural 1 auto failures and these type of reroll abilities that require you to not know the result of the roll.

Ninja in the Rye wrote:

This is something that's been bugging me since the podcast. I hate, hate, hate abilities like Nimble Dodge.

+2 to AC vs a single attack and it has to be declared before the attack is rolled just means that I'll use it, my enemy will either hit or miss me easily and then I'll feel like the ability is a complete waste over and over until I find a better use for my reaction and use that instead.

If it applied after the attack roll result is announced then I feel like I'm actually dodging something.

If it applies to every attack that enemy makes in the round then at least I feel like I'm getting some value out of my action as there's a decent chance that +2 will make a difference spread out over multiple attacks each turn.

I am curious where you might be getting the "it has to be declared before the attack" part? The preview only states: Nimble Dodge, a reaction that increases the rogue's Armor Class by 2 at a whim.

At a whim is pretty open and certainly would not, to me, imply I have to declare my reaction before the other party rolls their attack. My expectation is that reactions can come at anytime and can interrupt current actions. Like deciding to nimble dodge after seeing the attack roll, or even after seeing the damage roll. Using shield Block after seeing the damage roll potentially.

Now it's absolutely plausible I missed some other clarification that indicated more clearly the timing on this and/or reactions as a whole.. but without such a clarification I see no reason that one could not Nimble Dodge at any point before the action is fully resolved and thus decide either because it's a crit you don't want to take or they rolled max damage but the +2 AC would make it a miss that you would like to use your reaction at that point.

I don't mean to be a debbie downer... But Paizo has ALWAYS designed these types of actions to have to be declared before knowledge of the end result is known (exceptions to this philosophy have also always been considered exceptionally powerful by the design team as well). Starfinder actually has a paragraph in the combat chapter dedicated to saying you must use rerolls before the GM declares the result of the first die roll.

And like Ninja in the Rye, I've always hated this design philosophy. I want to minimize the times my ability is wasted. It's one thing for a reroll to be wasted because the second die roll is just as poor as the first. It's another thing for me to use the reroll, get a worse result and find out the first result would of been fine. I also think it is annoying to have to tell the GM "please don't declare my result right away so I can weight my reroll options".

As is, the Class Cannon Podcast showed the rogue having to declare the use of the nimble dodge before being attacked and being unable to go back and declare it. And I feel that it shares same sense of disappointment and frustration if I waste the ability on a Nat 1 roll only for the enemy to get a hit by an attack that only beat my ac by 1 on the second attack.

I'll be honest. My bigger issue with the current healing system is CLW can cure the most grievous of injuries for a low-level character and yet it increasingly loses potency as a character gains power. This isn't something I think happens a great deal in fantasy fiction that involves magical healing (unless it's purposely satirizing TTRPGs or MMORPGs or involves character's stuck in such games).

The healing surge system of 4e may not have been perfect but it did atleast get rid of the sensation above since most healing powers used a healing surge and gave the character's healing surge value (typically 1/4 total hp but that could be increased with options).

That being said, all the previews show that they aren't going to go in that direction.

So instead of worrying about that, let me just say that PF1E will punish characters who don't heal between fights. See symbol of death. So stick me in with the group that prefers to be capped off between fights. Because I've played a scenario in which my character's death at such a symbol would of ruined the narrative of the story since he was the central character in this particular part of the story and had the group spent a short bit to heal up between fights, my HP total would have been above the threshold of the spell.

So I'm Team "Wands of low-level healing magic suck because it doesn't make sense that curative magic loses potency as people gain levels and yet I prefer to be fully healed between fights".

Final note: I do still enjoy playing PF1e and SF despite both having ever weakening healing options. =)

I would just like to mention that I was planning on being involved with this with my paladin quasi-deity Xemna in WotR. So I have some mixed feelings on just pushing her ahead full steam towards redeemed without some guidance for how the players of WotR (or other APs I suppose) might accomplish this themselves. It's complicated?

xevious573 wrote:

vagabond_666 wrote:

xevious573 wrote:

I don't know guys.... I feel like... this shows that the numerical difference between two individuals of widely varying degrees of skill can be quite large.

Or, you know, if skill focus is no longer a thing, it's a system where someone with no training and decidedly average attributes, will be better at doing something that someone with godlike attributes and legendary skills 25% of the time...

Um wrong.... So. Very. Wrong.

Okay, more math.

If the fighter rolls a natural 20 (5%), our rogue needs to roll a 4 or lower (20%) to be lower then the fighter. ((.05*.2 = .01)). That means this scenario has a 1% chance of happening.

If the fighter rolls a natural 19 or higher (10%), our rogue needs to roll a 3 (15%) or lower to be lower then the fighter. ((.1*.15= .015)). 1.5% chance of happening.

If the fighter rolls a natural 18 or higher (15%), our rogue needs to roll a 2 (10%) or lower to be lower then the fighter. ((.1*.15= .015)). 1.5% chance of happening.

Finally if the fighter rolls a natural 17 or higher (20%), our rogue needs to roll a nat 1 (5%) to be lower then the fighter. ((.05*.2 = .01)). That means this scenario has a 1% chance of happening.

Add up all the values above (1%+1.5%+1.5%+1%) and you get a total of 5%. The fighter has a 5% chance of beating this rogue in a competition of stealth. If I'm remembering my math correctly. This is the total chance of any of these scenarios playing out because even if the rogue should roll terrible, the fighter would have to roll incredibly well to beat that rogue in a contest of stealth. And that's assuming there is no skill focus.

EDIT: I believe there's something wrong with my math. I think that something wrong pushes things even further in my favor but I think there is something still wrong with it. Get back to you.

Quick maths is bad maths. I concede that I am wrong and that it's 5%. This is still unacceptable.

That's... unacceptable to you?

Huh... Yet we're okay with the natural 1 (5% chance btw) auto fail on saving throws even if your saving throw bonus dwarfs the DC even without the roll?

Is it okay for a 1st level wizard or bard successfully casting charm person on a 20th level cleric even though that cleric would likely need to roll a negative number to actually get lower than the DC of the spell?

Alternative thought experiment... have you considered the mathematics of two characters arm wrestling? One of the characters has a STR of 20 (+5) (1st level max and likely contestant for world's strongest (wo)man) and the other has a STR of 10 (0)(1st level average). Most DMs would say that'd be an opposed STR check.

The point difference between these two characters only a 5pt difference. Compared to my 15pt difference, just think about how big the % chance of the 10 STR character has of beating the 20 STR man... It's a lot higher then the math I shown above for the stealth competition....

xevious573 wrote:

I don't know guys.... I feel like... this shows that the numerical difference between two individuals of widely varying degrees of skill can be quite large.

Or, you know, if skill focus is no longer a thing, it's a system where someone with no training and decidedly average attributes, will be better at doing something that someone with godlike attributes and legendary skills 25% of the time...

Um wrong.... So. Very. Wrong.

Okay, more math.

If the fighter rolls a natural 20 (5%), our rogue needs to roll a 4 or lower (20%) to be lower then the fighter. ((.05*.2 = .01)). That means this scenario has a 1% chance of happening.

If the fighter rolls a natural 19 or higher (10%), our rogue needs to roll a 3 (15%) or lower to be lower then the fighter. ((.1*.15= .015)). 1.5% chance of happening.

If the fighter rolls a natural 18 or higher (15%), our rogue needs to roll a 2 (10%) or lower to be lower then the fighter. ((.1*.15= .015)). 1.5% chance of happening.

Finally if the fighter rolls a natural 17 or higher (20%), our rogue needs to roll a nat 1 (5%) to be lower then the fighter. ((.05*.2 = .01)). That means this scenario has a 1% chance of happening.

Add up all the values above (1%+1.5%+1.5%+1%) and you get a total of 5%. The fighter has a 5% chance of beating this rogue in a competition of stealth. If I'm remembering my math correctly. This is the total chance of any of these scenarios playing out because even if the rogue should roll terrible, the fighter would have to roll incredibly well to beat that rogue in a contest of stealth. And that's assuming there is no skill focus.

EDIT: I believe there's something wrong with my math. I think that something wrong pushes things even further in my favor but I think there is something still wrong with it. Get back to you.

As I've said in another thread, not counting any sort of temporary buff effects or circumstance bonuses or penalties, it is possible to build two level 20 characters in PF2 with an all-day gap between their bonuses in the same skill of around 17-18. Proficiency is one piece of that split, with a potential gap up to 5 (and 5 is a really big advantage; all other modifiers being equal, which is almost certainly an overestimate of the untrained character, and rolling the same number on a d20, half of the untrained character's successes are critical successes for the legendary character, and half of the untrained character's failures are successes for the legendary character).

Some math. Let's assume a maximum attribute can reach is 30. This is a reasonable assumption because Starfinder has a max attribute of 28 and it's attribute increasing system is influencing PF2. This score gives us a modifier of +10.

Now, The difference between untrained and legendary is a total of 5 points (ranging from -2 to +3).

Now let's compare 2 level 20 characters (and thus we can ignore level in the equation).

Character 1(A boisterous Heavily Armored fighter) has a 10 dex (this is somewhat unlikely but bear with me) and is untrained in stealth for a -2 total modifer.

Character 2(Master Thief who views Norgorber as his only true rival) has a 30 dex (+10) and is legendary in stealth (+3). Total modifier is +13.

The total difference between the stealth capabilities of these 2 character is 15pts. If skill focus is still a thing, that's another 3pts if it's similar to its past iterations. Which btw brings us to the hypothetical difference Mark mentions in the quote above.

I don't know guys.... I feel like... this shows that the numerical difference between two individuals of widely varying degrees of skill can be quite large.

Arssanguinus wrote:

BigNorseWolf wrote:

Lady Firebird wrote:

Look at Conan. Or Aragorn. Two examples off the top of my head who have a lot of skills and competence in broad areas.

Yes, but they're either solo heroes or buffy and friends, not part of a team where everyone has their own specialty.

They also seem to have rolled straight 18s at character creation...

Um ... Gimli , Legolas, for example were hardly scrubs ....

Sure, Aragorn had a fairly wide range of skills, but he was also a Ranger. Note that when they needed to know about dwarven history, he'd defer to Gimli, and when they needed a lock picked or something stolen, he'd defer to Frodo. He didn't simply say "oh, I'm higher level than you, therefor better than you at this thing!"

Presumably he's untrained in Dwarven Lore and Lock Picking and thus his level bonus doesn't matter. He's untrained and thus can't do those things. He might have the higher number the proficiency (or lack thereof) says he can't and thus his number doesn't matter.

Zaister wrote:

There are some sample NPCs for cultists, the Free Captains, Hellknights, mercenaries, security forces and street gangs. Nothing especially dedicated to gods or threats, besides maybe in the individual world's sections.

Nothing outside the Golarion system, but well, this is the Pact Worlds book.

I was sort of hoping something on the Veskarium would be included, seeing as they are Pact Worlds members..... No?

They aren't Pact Worlds members but I believe instead an uneasy alliance exists between the Veskarium and the Pact Worlds due the presence of other galactic threats such as the Swarm and the Azlanti Star Empire.

EDIT: Ninja'd

Money is hard. Gonna need to put things on hold for now. Thanks!

Gudrun the Reader wrote:

AHeroNamedHawke wrote:

Ill give you the benefit of the doubt on your +40 comment, because thats impossible without getting Path of War involved (which I highly recommend).

** spoiler omitted **

Lorewarden has no CMB bonus outside of its +2 insight from Know Thy Enemy, which doesnt stack with a Rose Prism, dueling weapons are for disarm and you have a nameless +4 luck bonus I assume came from your ass

So it looks to me like thats a grand total of 9+5+4+4+2+2+2+4=32, which is not even close

Also the numbers you listed add up to 42, maybe double check a few things in the future

Besides you being rude with that post overall, all of the math in their post checks out. The source of that +4 luck bonus is from Pathfinder Society Field Guide, which introduce the first version of the Dueling property... which gives twice the weapon's enhancement bonus as a bonus to any maneuver performed by the weapon specifically, such as disarm and trip among other things...

And also you apparently don't realize that old lorewarden had

Maneuver Mastery (Ex): At 3rd level, a lore warden gains a +2 bonus on all CMB checks and to his CMD. This bonus increases to +4 at 7th level, +6 at 11th level, and +8 at 15th level. This ability replaces armor training 1.

This was changed to the Brawler's Maneuver Training class feature while still retaining Know Thy Enemy (which their original math didn't even count, so your bit about the ioun stone and the lore warden not stacking is doubly not applicable) in Adventurer's Guide. This effectively halved the bonus but it's still pretty good and stacks with everything else in that list.

The last point seems painfully obvious but I'll try to sum it up for you: +32 trip cmb is way too high for a 9th level character... +38 (which takes into to account the changes to Maneuver Mastery [Side note: Their original math is correct (You added an additional +2 due to poor notation on their part (+2 Dueling weapon +2 enhancement and +4 luck is what they listed the +6 bonus to trip the weapon gives and you accidentally added the weapon enhancement again]) is also way too high! Why are we saying this was a good idea allowing to exist in the game?

The 100 shield is not effective against chunk of energy weapons so how effective is it.

Only not effective against LASERS and maybe PLASMA. Still protects against Cryo, Flame, Shock, Sonic, and Acid. Plus I made a mistake, It's only 50 THP.

Also a fighter is very likely to have higher than 20 con.

Only if they get Wishes/Manuals. I don't assume that at all and even if you did get those, I would assume those would go to Str or Dex before Con with most characters.

Another factor is high item level weapons in Starfinder do much more damage than weapons in Pathfinder.

You're not wrong about this and that's why I'm personally not sure whether it's an issue or not. Anyway, This assumed starting with a 10 con and only putting a +2 personal enhancement towards it. A Vesk Melee Soldier might start with a 14 Con and put a +4 personal enhancement towards it for an ending score of Constitution of 24 which gives another 40sp.

EDIT: Apparently Cryo Weapons might bypass force shields since it's a supercooled gas. A comment to this effect in the description of Cryo and Plasma weapons or in Force Shields would of been appreciated.

Human Fighter 20
14 or 15 Starting Con + 6 Enhancement Bonus = 20 Con or +5 per level
Toughness and Favored Class adds an additional +2 per level

17+([5.5+7]*19) = 254.5hp (This doesn't count a potential 40-60hp from Wish which brings it to 294.5-310.5hp)

If the fighter pays the money to retrain up his hp (not necessarily recommended) then his hp is 17*20 = 340hp (380 or 400 with Wishes)
-------
Human Soldier 20
10 Starting Con + 8 Level Up Bonus + 2 Personal Upgrade Bonus = 20 Con or +5 per level
Toughness adds an addition +1 per level

(7+5+1)*20 = 260sp
([2 or 4 or 6]+7)+(7*19) = 142 or 144 or 146hp

402-406 effective HP

50thp Force Shield Armor mod (doesn't protect against lasers and other light based attacks but still likely a good idea)

452-456 effective HP (with 10 fast healing on the 50thp force force shield)

With the force shield, the Solder effectively has twice HP as a Fighter. I think an Engineer with Improved Shield Boost might be able to have more effective HP (2x mechanic level matches the Extra SP/level and Extra HP/level that Soldier has and they get add their Int Mod to the THP)
--------

I, personally, think it's reasonable to say they have effectively doubled HP pools. I don't yet know if this is a problem considering I haven't had the chance to play.

Assuming I get to play anytime soon, I was planning on playing an Android Exocortex Mechanic with either Mercenary or Bounty Hunter. I was planning on being very tanky and combat focused by taking Shield Boost options, Overclocking options, and a few side options such as visual processing and invisibility bypass amongst others. I WASN'T going to take overcharging options as I don't feel those are necessarily worth the investment but I was considering investment into additional armaments such as snipers, heavy weapons, and/or power armor. I'm leaning towards heavy weapons and power armor here but that might change if the group needs a stealthy mechanic instead (using optic camouflage and invisibility options from exocortex mods).

My favorite thing about the engineer is the fact that the class feels extremely versatile. It has utility for combat and outside combat. It can even do both in a pinch since the exocortex can let me hack computers while I'm firing away at enemies. It's probably my favorite of the classes.

xevious573 wrote:

Those who are saying this is adding complexity... I don't get it o_O???

Split your binder in 6 parts, one part for type of boon. After the mission briefing, spend 5-10 minutes (possibly longer, we'll see) going through your binder, select one boon of each type, then take them out of the binder and place them under your character sheet for future reference. PRESTO! DONE! Put your binder of boons away and game on!

That "Put your binder of boons away and game on!" is the stated design goal and I really don't understand how this isn't supposed to save time for a character with a lot of boons compared to what they described PFS situation being.

My PFS binder is already split into 30 different parts, one for each non-seeker-tier character. And the chronicles are in chronological order. The easier thing is to write them all down on a separate sheet and pick from there, but there are a lot of players with shoddy bookkeeping who are already challenged by things like audits or telling us how much fame they have.

30 parts? That's a lot of characters! I'm intensely jealous of your PFS scene! There is basically no local scene for PFS where I live and the nearest one that I know of is quite a drive away on a day and time when I'm working. Anyway, I see your point.

Those who are saying this is adding complexity... I don't get it o_O???

Split your binder in 6 parts, one part for type of boon. After the mission briefing, spend 5-10 minutes (possibly longer, we'll see) going through your binder, select one boon of each type, then take them out of the binder and place them under your character sheet for future reference. PRESTO! DONE! Put your binder of boons away and game on!

That "Put your binder of boons away and game on!" is the stated design goal and I really don't understand how this isn't supposed to save time for a character with a lot of boons compared to what they described PFS situation being.

xevious573 wrote:

Distant Scholar wrote:

Owen K. C. Stephens wrote:

ENHenry wrote:

Actually, the personal ehancers don't shock me as much as the ability score increases - Holy Lady of Graves!!! :-o

However, since it was said that feats and items granting stright bonuses were less common, I can see where you might want something like this - I'm in a "wait and see" attitude, hopefully all will mesh well together and characters walking around with a bunch of 18s and 20s won't look totally off the wall.

The system actually makes it a lot easier to not be stuck with 8s, 10s, and 12s in secondary ability scores, but it doesn't make it any easier to have several 18s or 20s. It can be more difficult to have several of those, actually.

Perhaps I am misreading the blog, but it sounds like someone with a 14/14/12/12/12/12 starting array who spreads out bonuses evenly would be 18/18/18/18/18/18 at 20th level. I don't know how easy a 14/14/12/12/12/12 starting array will be to get in Starfinder.

You're math is incorrect I believe:

14/14/12/12/12/12 Starting
16/16/14/14/12/12 5th
18/18/16/16/12/12 10th
18/18/18/18/14/14 15th
19/19/18/18/16/16 20th

Is I how I see that ending...

Or you do it like this and get those 18s:

14/14/12/12/12/12 starting
14/14/14/14/14/14 5th
16/16/16/16/14/14 10th
18/18/16/16/16/16 15th
18/18/18/18/18/18 20th

Brad got there before you. It's duly noted.

Owen K. C. Stephens wrote:

ENHenry wrote:

Actually, the personal ehancers don't shock me as much as the ability score increases - Holy Lady of Graves!!! :-o

However, since it was said that feats and items granting stright bonuses were less common, I can see where you might want something like this - I'm in a "wait and see" attitude, hopefully all will mesh well together and characters walking around with a bunch of 18s and 20s won't look totally off the wall.

The system actually makes it a lot easier to not be stuck with 8s, 10s, and 12s in secondary ability scores, but it doesn't make it any easier to have several 18s or 20s. It can be more difficult to have several of those, actually.

Perhaps I am misreading the blog, but it sounds like someone with a 14/14/12/12/12/12 starting array who spreads out bonuses evenly would be 18/18/18/18/18/18 at 20th level. I don't know how easy a 14/14/12/12/12/12 starting array will be to get in Starfinder.

You're math is incorrect I believe:

14/14/12/12/12/12 Starting
16/16/14/14/12/12 5th
18/18/16/16/12/12 10th
18/18/18/18/14/14 15th
19/19/18/18/16/16 20th

Is I how I see that ending...

I find it odd that the system is weirdly punishing for starting with a 17 in a stat.

Overspecialization is commonly punished in RPGs. There isn't anything particularly odd about that. My question is how racial starting stat increases plays into this particular stat increase system. For example, will a starting 18 in Dex for elves (assuming same racial stat modifier) increase +2 at 5th level?

Guardian 3rd Tier Mythic Power.

Dimensional Grappler (Su): When you have an opponent grappled or pinned and it attempts to use a teleportation effect, you can attempt a Will save against the effect, even if it would not normally allow a save. If you succeed, you learn the type of teleportation effect (such as dimension door) and the creature's intended destination, and then may prevent the effect (as if using a quickened dimensional anchor, using your character level as your caster level) or accompany the opponent as if you were part of its gear with negligible weight.

If you're interested in following along a teleporting opponent.

More accessible is Teleport Tactician (though still pretty limited really) which doesn't let you follow along or prevent a teleport but let's you get an attack of opportunity in whether or not the creature succeeds in casting defensively or not.

Tetori Monks can't follow along a grappled target but at 9th level they can suppress freedom of movement and at 13th level, they can apply a dimensional anchor effect to their grapples by spending ki.

Oath against fiends can spend a smite evil to apply dimensional anchor to a teleporting Evil-Outsider 30ft away or less. They also passively project an aura out to 20ft the makes teleporting Evil-Outsiders require making a saving throw to have the teleportation effect not be prevented (Also they are one of a small collection of Archetypes that have a feat augmenting one of their features with the Painful Anchor spell which messes with Evil-Outsiders summoning or teleportation effects further).

The Cold Iron Warden Inquisitor Archetype can set up a field of energy that is disruptive to teleportation effects of evil outsiders and they can even track the location of where a teleportation effect goes if they are quick enough.

There are probably some other options that mess up or inhibit teleportation effects but these are the ones I can think of off the top my head.

I would go with Evangelist Cleric with Heroism Subdomain then focus on Summoning spells with Augment summoning and such. So much party support and yet maximizing the benefits of your bardic performance and heroism aura by providing more allies.

I think there is something to being this *scrunches fingers together* close to being able to fit her within a 25 pt buy model and showing how it can be done. After all, I'm playing a roleplaying game and if I want my character to be just like Red Sonja, well I just showed how I can accomplish that (atleast within the context of her ability scores).

And anyway, I did figure that was going to be the case. I just wanted to math.

Hayato Ken:

At the current ability point spread for her, it's 32 pts.

But with some "modifications" it could be made to fit a 25 pt buy.
1) Make the 9 Wis an 8.
2) Remove Improved Unarmed Strike from her feat list unless it's an unmarked bonus feat from her archetype.
3) Probably would have to modify her skills a tad bit but I'm too lazy to figure out her skill point spread.
4) Trade the Bonus Feat and Skilled Racial trait for Dual Talent.

These modifications would make her fit in a 25 pt buy.

Slashing fury looks like it's the archetype's replacement for Hunter's Bond and Death Vow replacing Favored Enemy.

I think it would be fine. With its size, its going to struggle for much of Wrath of the Righteous. Especially if the Paladin doesn't have a bunch of mounted combat feats.

And most likely, his mount is going to fail one of the big AoE saves like frightful presence and flee from the battle. If the Paladin is riding it at the time, he is going to be taken for a ride too.

"Fine" is a relative term I suppose. A cohort that provides more hindrance then assistance most likely isn't that fun for a player and kills the bada** motif of a knight riding a dragon into battle real good and thus probably isn't... "fine".

The Bestiary recommends allowing players to get Young True Dragons for the Leadership Feat counting as a Cohort equal to it's CR+8. In this case, a Young Silver Dragon would be a level 18 Cohort or technically 1 level beyond the maximum of the Leadership Table...

But I'll be honest - Dragons are way over-cohort-CR'd. Especially if you're playing a mythic game.

At the levels your PCs are at. Their opponents would have to roll a negative number, perhaps as low -10, in order to miss the Young Silver Dragon's AC of 22. And 104 HP, might, MIGHT, take up 2 swings from an opponent. The thing is, EVEN if your Players take the time and intense resource cost to give the dragon's good gear, they are still going to be way, way under-powered against the foes your PCs will face.

Personal opinion: It's a nice flavor thing to have a Young Silver Dragon as a cohort, but flavor isn't really enjoyable if the dragon is taken out "incidentally" by Attacks/Spells/Special Abilities the enemies were actually aiming at the PCs.

As to your concerns for the Adult Silver Dragon's Magic and Breathe Weapon. I personally don't feel 12d8 in a 50-ft cone at Ref DC 23 is extremely overwhelming at level 20 and will likely be mostly a low-CR "mob-killer" at best. Might actually help speed up your game when fighting big groups of low-low-CR enemies since your party lacks AoE capabilities. As to the spells, the Caster Level of 7 means, your dragons spells will.... fail against most enemies that have SR around the Party's Average Character Level (and practically all Demons above Dretches and Quasits have SR). Even one's that are ACL-5. And a Dispel Magic with a CL of 7... is probably not going to dispel diddly-squat.

This is, of course, my own personal opinion that I am trying to back up with a cursory look at the stats of the Dragons and the Monster Statistics Table of the Bestiary. I don't have any advice to yet offer you on getting this to work but I wish you good luck on your endeavor.

Why no charisma to Atk and Dmg for Fighting Fan(s) for Geishas or even Whips for Calistria worshippers??? ;_; *runs off crying*

Porridge wrote:

Mark Seifter wrote:

QuidEst wrote:

MusicAddict wrote:

Does purist mean you can take explosion and use it with say metal, or does the lime about energy vs physical cover that?

I think that covers it, because otherwise there's not much that just says "energy blasts only". Disintegrating Infusion is another good energy only choice, allowing you to get it on a non-composite blast.

Yup, or on blue flame for an incredibly damaging flame that leaves nothing left (like a great wyrm red dragon's breath weapon).

If the elemental purist doesn't get expanded element, does that mean they can't get the blue flame composite blast?...

("Prerequisite(s): primary element (fire), expanded element (fire).")

They automatically get their own element's composite blast as if expanding into the same element. Particularly good for earth and fire, since they don't have a second basic blast they're passing up.

And Aether. They also don't have a second basic blast.

...YAY! Now my telekineticist can actually do a telekinetic storm!!! Well mostly. Still no stunning option I am aware of but whatevs!

Nope, no reason. Apparently I should read better.

EDIT: Actually, one last thing did occur to me. If you use kinetic blade while in a grapple (and any other situation besides preventing an attack of opportunity), do you still need to make a concentration check for kinetic blade. Not to prevent an AoO of course but on account of, you know, sla and grapple not mixing so well. I promise I'm not trying to be obstinate. Promise! (Since it's as part of an attack, should I just assume it suffers the normal penalties attack receive while a grapple).

Perhaps it's the precedent of Magus Spell Combat which is the thing closest to this ability (until the warlock vigilante archetype perhaps?) that I could think of but that's where my headspace currently is when it concerns this. Not to discount what you're saying because I do think you're right. Just explaining where my confusion stems from.

RAW is pretty clear, I'm asking about intent. I had to tk blast a salamander (with a barrel of scrap metal it had behind it if you're curious) from a grapple last night and remembered kinetic blast is a SLA (I did succeed on my conc check, thanks to the wound system). This morning, it hit me that I don't remember text in kinetic blade specifically getting rid of concentration checks of melee casting and checked just to make sure. And lo and behold, no text exists.

So now I ask my thread title. Outta curiousity more than anything. Also might apply to K. Whip and K. Fist.

...

The typical benefit is in the form of extended summon monster lists. It's up in the air, I suppose, if Oracle's gain the benefits of Variant Spellcasting options if they choose to dedicate themselves to a deity.

Priesthood is something I wish the world designers/game designers had spent more time developing as a game mechanic. Longer then simply the Variant Spellcasting paragraph each deity received in Inner Sea Gods.

Frosthammer seems to be written very much to not be Cleric only, being that the introductory fluff text (not even included in the spell entry itself) says Priest of Kostchtchie, and then the spell goes on Ranger and Antipaladin lists as well. If Rangers can count as Priests of Kostchtchie then I have no idea how Oracles wouldn't. I think that list may be wrong about this spell. Frosthammer even has text to let Oracles base it off CHA.

The other spells that are Oracle only or Wizard only have effects that only work for those classes. A spell that interacts with the casters Oracle curse is no use for a Cleric, and spells that affect preparation of spells or copying in to spellbooks are no use to a Sorcerer.

A real quick tangent. In Golarion, "Priests of [Insert Deity here]" can be of any classes the deity decides s/he/it will accept as priests.

So I think the logic best follows as:

It can be assumed that ALL Clerics in Good Standing with Their God are Priests.

But it can't be assumed that ALL Priests of a god are Clerics.

Many gods have Bards(Shelyn, Desna, Cayden Cailean, Calistria), Rangers (Kostchtchie, Erastil, Cernunnos), Antipaladins(So many evil gods probably), and Paladins(Iomedae, Ragathiel, Vildeis) as "priests". Some likely even have some none-spellcasting classes or very different spell casting classes since Irori has clergy that are monks (and while Psychic wasn't out when Inner Sea Gods came out, I think it can fit the bill of a priest with the Lore or Self-Perfection discipline).

So, keeping in mind the idea of the Oracle of Athens/Athena and Oracle of Apollo, I suspect that if an Oracle decides to dedicate herself to a god, they too can be priests of a god. And since Frosthammer is on the cleric spell list and the Oracle uses the cleric spell list, I suspect a Winter Oracle of Kostchtchie can use Frosthamer.

/tangent /rant

CampinCarl9127 wrote:

swoosh wrote:

CampinCarl9127 wrote:

But pretty much everybody agrees (including the PDT) that it's an extremely reasonable houserule.

PDT agreed it'd be a reasonable houserule, but PDT didn't agree enough to actually change the rule themselves, however.

...yes? And your point is?

The point is that while PDT says it's a reasonable houserule, they had enough reservations with the idea that they were unwilling to actually make changes themselves, which says something. I'm not sure what, but definitely something.

Could say a multitude of things. My personal favorite interpretation is:

Wisdom
Wisdom (if you're a cleric) or Charisma (if you're an oracle)
your spellcasting ability modifier

Um, based the size comparison up above, pagination/page fitting is going to become a big problem very quickly if this change was to be put into future iterations of the Core Rulebook, it's one of the things they must keep track of when applying errata to that document, they don't want to invalidate "future" refences to sections of the CRB. For example, Reign of Winter Player's Guide mentions that Smoked Goggles are in Ultimate Equipment pg 72 so the PDT tries to avoid making any changes that will affect page count (they can only publish books with page totals in multiples of 16 I believe but could be wrong) or the location of each item so as to not invalidate any of their other documents. The same concept applies to all of their hardcover books (since they don't, frustratingly enough, errata any of their other books).

With that in mind, my own interpretation is simply that it would caused that type of issue and they opted instead that merely say it's a reasonable change. Of course I'm not the PDT nor can I say I can read their minds, but I think I can atleast see a major issue they would of ran into.