Pathfinder Roleplaying Game: Advanced Class Guide (OGL)

Well true, and that pillar could be the shaman;)

Considering there are ten new classes, I wish they had more then two of the new iconics on the cover.

The core book introduced 11 iconics and there were only 2 on its cover. Having two iconics on the covers of most of the hardcover books in the RPG line seems to be the standard. The Mythic book is the only one that really breaks this pattern with twice as many, but that seems to be relevant to the theme of mythic. There's also the ARG if you consider the Tengu to be iconic, but as far as I know he's not.

Removed some posts—chill, people. This product isn't even released yet, and people play the game differently, so don't get too hung up on how somebody else plays a class.

Mnemaxa wrote:

magnuskn wrote:

So, Bloodrager and Swashbuckler vs. an incorporeal undead dragon? I hope the Bloodrager is well equipped, because the Swashbuckler will do absolutely nothing against that type of monster. ^^

Female half-elf Swashbuckler is looking swell, though.

If it were just undead there wouldn't be a problem.

True enough. I'm not sure it was a good idea to negate precision damage for some enemy types. Every time the developers make those inherent nerfs in the name of "realism", it's the martial classes which suffer, while primary spellcasters shrug and still do their thing (and I am not only talking about incorporeal opponents).

There's also the problem that one of the most common rule mistakes I've encountered at the table is GMs who believe that immunity to precision damage is more widespread than is actually the case. So they'll think that a construct (such as a stone golem) can't be sneak-attacked.

Does anyone know how many pages this boom is gonna have? Im kinda hoping its gonna be core book size and looking forward to alot of reading lol

I am surprised it doesn't say in the product description.

Does anyone know how many pages this boom is gonna have? Im kinda hoping its gonna be core book size and looking forward to alot of reading lol

Every RPG Hardcover has had 256 pages (except the Core Rulebook, naturally).

I'd be surprised if this book broke that trend.

Redneckdevil wrote:

Does anyone know how many pages this boom is gonna have? Im kinda hoping its gonna be core book size and looking forward to alot of reading lol

Every RPG Hardcover has had 256 pages (except the Core Rulebook, naturally).

I'd be surprised if this book broke that trend.

APG is 336 pages and bestiaries are 320 pages.

I am going to guess it could be similar to the APG in size, despite having more classes than that book had.

Alexander Augunas wrote:

Redneckdevil wrote:

Does anyone know how many pages this boom is gonna have? Im kinda hoping its gonna be core book size and looking forward to alot of reading lol

Every RPG Hardcover has had 256 pages (except the Core Rulebook, naturally).

I'd be surprised if this book broke that trend.

APG is 336 pages and bestiaries are 320 pages.

Also the Ultimate Equipment book is 398 pages.

Alexander Augunas wrote:

Every RPG Hardcover has had 256 pages (except the Core Rulebook, naturally).

APG is 336 pages and bestiaries are 320 pages.

Punch, punch, upper cut!

Ouch. Looks like I'm wrong.

Also the Ultimate Equipment book is 398 pages.

KOOOOOOOOOOOO!

I am going to guess it could be similar to the APG in size, despite having more classes than that book had.

Not to mention the archetypes, feats and spells for those and previous classes...

Alexander Augunas wrote:

My fingers are crossed for ninja, samurai, and antipaladin material. I was pleased with the ninja tricks in Champions of Balance and I'm hopeful for more!

antipaladin has tons of material it needs in pathfinder.

With some creative tinkering there's no reason why you couldn't convert a bunch of the Paladins's goodies into nasties for the Antipaladin.

Redneckdevil wrote:

Does anyone know how many pages this boom is gonna have? Im kinda hoping its gonna be core book size and looking forward to alot of reading lol

Every RPG Hardcover has had 256 pages (except the Core Rulebook, naturally).

I'd be surprised if this book broke that trend.

Statistical analysis should be able to make or break that hypothesis if you dropped all the books and page totals into Excel and used regression.

Any word on whether or not there will be some new Oracle Curses included in this book?

Swashbucklers and rogues are still kind of hosed against anyone with concealment (unless they pay the feat tax) as well as ooze and elementals.

This is what I was remembering earlier that there's some dispute on. Sneak Attack specifically states that it isn't useful against things with concealment. Precise Strike doesn't say anything of the kind. It says that:

Any creature that is immune to sneak attacks is immune to a precise strike, and any item or ability that protects a creature from critical hits also protects a creature from a precise strike.

Being concealed is neither being 'a creature immune to sneak attack' nor is it something that protects from critical hits. Being incorporeal, an elemental, or an ooze definitely protects you, but concealment doesn't seem to.

I am also curious if there are any new Oracle curses?

I am also curious if there are any new Oracle curses?

Glad to know I'm not alone in this. We seriously need some more of them.

Quote:

I am also curious if there are any new Oracle curses?

Glad to know I'm not alone in this. We seriously need some more of them.

No...YOU ARE NOT ALONE :)

Berselius wrote:

Quote:

I am also curious if there are any new Oracle curses?

Glad to know I'm not alone in this. We seriously need some more of them.

No...YOU ARE NOT ALONE :)

New Oracle Curse: Always Alone.

You can see people, hear them, even speak to them, but they never seem entirely real to you, and the ability to deeply connect and coordinate with others is a great mystery to you, leaving you struggling to form bonds of trust or friendship or love.

You can neither benefit from nor perform the Aid Other action, and do not receive or grant flanking benefits, nor can you take advantage of (or grant anyone else the effects of) any Teamwork feat. Unable (or unwilling) to fully trust others with your safety, you automatically stabilize when Dying and receive a +4 competence bonus to Heal checks on yourself.

At 5th level, you can use a variation of the Aid Other action on yourself only as a move equivalent action, granting yourself a +2 bonus to a single attack roll on this turn, a +2 bonus to Armor Class against a single foe, or a +2 bonus to a trained skill use. At 10th level, any spell you cast upon yourself with a range of Personal is Extended, without increasing the casting time or level of the spell (this does not stack with the Extend Spell metamagic feat). At 15th level, you automatically succeed on a roll to Aid Other on yourself, and you can perform this action as an immediate or swift action up to once per round.

nighttree wrote:

Berselius wrote:

Quote:

I am also curious if there are any new Oracle curses?

Glad to know I'm not alone in this. We seriously need some more of them.

No...YOU ARE NOT ALONE :)

New Oracle Curse: Always Alone.

You can see people, hear them, even speak to them, but they never seem entirely real to you, and the ability to deeply connect and coordinate with others is a great mystery to you, leaving you struggling to form bonds of trust or friendship or love.

You can neither benefit from nor perform the Aid Other action, and do not receive or grant flanking benefits, nor can you take advantage of (or grant anyone else the effects of) any Teamwork feat. Unable (or unwilling) to fully trust others with your safety, you automatically stabilize when Dying and receive a +4 competence bonus to Heal checks on yourself.

At 5th level, you can use a variation of the Aid Other action on yourself only as a move equivalent action, granting yourself a +2 bonus to a single attack roll on this turn, a +2 bonus to Armor Class against a single foe, or a +2 bonus to a trained skill use. At 10th level, any spell you cast upon yourself with a range of Personal is Extended, without increasing the casting time or level of the spell (this does not stack with the Extend Spell metamagic feat). At 15th level, you automatically succeed on a roll to Aid Other on yourself, and you can perform this action as an immediate or swift action up to once per round.

One would think that such a curse would include something like "Whenever a spell you cast targets a limited number of creatures, each creature counts as two creatures. Whenever you are the subject of a spell that targets a limited number of creatures, you count as two creatures towards that limit."

Kudaku wrote:

Swashbucklers and rogues are still kind of hosed against anyone with concealment (unless they pay the feat tax) as well as ooze and elementals.

This is what I was remembering earlier that there's some dispute on. Sneak Attack specifically states that it isn't useful against things with concealment. Precise Strike doesn't say anything of the kind. It says that:

ACG Playtest wrote:

Any creature that is immune to sneak attacks is immune to a precise strike, and any item or ability that protects a creature from critical hits also protects a creature from a precise strike.

Being concealed is neither being 'a creature immune to sneak attack' nor is it something that protects from critical hits. Being incorporeal, an elemental, or an ooze definitely protects you, but concealment doesn't seem to.

Well, Precision Damage is kind of hard to define in general. The term is used in many different feats and class features (Precise Strike, Up Close and Deadly etc), but I don't think it's been really nailed down and defined in a single rules section.

However, if you read the Shadow Strike feat, the description leads me to believe that you can't normally apply precision damage to a target with concealment:

Benefit: You can deal precision damage, such as sneak attack damage, against targets with concealment (but not total concealment).

If you could normally apply precision damage to targets with concealment then I don't see they'd use the much more general "precision damage" and list Sneak Attack as an example instead of specifying that the feat only interacts with Sneak Attack.

Yeah, that lends itself to the conclusion that Precision Damage does not apply to targets with Concealment. However, there have been enough badly worded feats that I wouldn't take it as completely conclusive.

Not to mention that it would add another class which is helpless to the deadly hazard of dim light and/or a light ground fog. Pretty pathetic for a front line class.

Yeah, that lends itself to the conclusion that Precision Damage does not apply to targets with Concealment. However, there have been enough badly worded feats that I wouldn't take it as completely conclusive.

Not to mention that it would add another class which is helpless to the deadly hazard of dim light and/or a light ground fog. Pretty pathetic for a front line class.

Agreed, I houseruled the concealment problem away a long time ago. The designers have stated that the "dim light in the alley? No sneak attack for you!" problem was unintended and in hindsight they would have worded it differently. That's why I bring it up actually, it would be hopefully be fairly easy to include phrasing in the Swashbuckler to avoid the issue, or even publish a clear definition of what works and doesn't work for Precision damage.

Well, I hope they did, because I am pretty sure that by now the book already is being printed. ^^

Then again, us suckers who buy the first printing have always been the ones which get stuck with stuff like the first versions of Antagonize or Terrible Remorse.

I can't wait to see the archetypes for the new classes. There's a lot of potential with them (especially the shaman) and I hope that it's utilized well.

As awesome as the new classes are, I agree, I'm looking forward to the original class archetypes. Shaman-esque Witch? Yes please.

So Sherlock Holmes, Zorro, Tarzan, and Conan walk into the Grand Lodge...

In anticipation of the upcoming ACG, I'm seeing in my head the aforementioned fictional characters coming to life in Pathfinder, maybe even for Society play.

I think yes Sherlock Holmes would be an Investigator and Zorro would be a Swashbuckler.

But what would Tarzan and Conan be?

But what would Tarzan and Conan be?

Darn, dirty barbarians.

Wouldn't Conan be a barbarian/rogue?

Conan's clearly a Slayer, maybe with a dip in Barbarian (mostly for Uncanny Dodge).

Tarzan could pretty readily be a Hunter.

On the Precision Damage thing: I said it was disputed/unclear, not that Swashbucklers could do damage to concealed targets for sure. And yeah, some official clarification on this point would definitely be nice.

Ooh, I noticed new evidence. Read Studied Strike, it explicitly contains the concealment prohibition (like Sneak Attack does). Now read Studied Combat. It also includes precision damage, but not the wording in question. The two abilities are closely linked. So closely the difference pretty much has to be intentional.

That's pretty strong evidence that it's not an inherent feature of precision damage. It also makes the wording on Shadow Strike relevant (and thus make sense), since it would also apply to Studied Strike.

Aaaaaaand someone has posted a review. Prescient chap.

My players told me recently I buy too many books for us to use in our games, given how little we get together these days. "Feh!" I shouted. "Feh on your 'too many books'!"

Yeah, I'm buying this. I've waited too long for this book. It must be mine.

One of my players said the same thing to me. My response was "You can never have too many books, only too few bookshelves."

Conan's clearly a Slayer, maybe with a dip in Barbarian (mostly for Uncanny Dodge).

Tarzan could pretty readily be a Hunter.

On the Precision Damage thing: I said it was disputed/unclear, not that Swashbucklers could do damage to concealed targets for sure. And yeah, some official clarification on this point would definitely be nice.

Also a thief and reaver. :D

“Hither came Conan, the Cimmerian, black-haired, sullen-eyed, sword in hand, a thief, a reaver, a slayer, with gigantic melancholies and gigantic mirth, to tread the jeweled thrones of the Earth under his sandaled feet.”

I wonder what a Barbarian/Paladin hybrid would be like...

Aaaaaaand someone has posted a review. Prescient chap.

John Woo, no less. I love his movies.

Aaaaaaand someone has posted a review. Prescient chap.

My Tarot, Runes, and pendulum all agree....I think he nailed it.

Oceanshieldwolf wrote:

Aaaaaaand someone has posted a review. Prescient chap.

John Woo, no less. I love his movies.

Wonder if he liked the new spell, summon doves?

Ooh, I noticed new evidence. Read Studied Strike, it explicitly contains the concealment prohibition (like Sneak Attack does). Now read Studied Combat. It also includes precision damage, but not the wording in question. The two abilities are closely linked. So closely the difference pretty much has to be intentional.

That's pretty strong evidence that it's not an inherent feature of precision damage. It also makes the wording on Shadow Strike relevant (and thus make sense), since it would also apply to Studied Strike.

Relevant to all precision damage being negated by concealment or to only certain types of it being negated by concealment?

Deadmanwalking wrote:

Ooh, I noticed new evidence. Read Studied Strike, it explicitly contains the concealment prohibition (like Sneak Attack does). Now read Studied Combat. It also includes precision damage, but not the wording in question. The two abilities are closely linked. So closely the difference pretty much has to be intentional.

That's pretty strong evidence that it's not an inherent feature of precision damage. It also makes the wording on Shadow Strike relevant (and thus make sense), since it would also apply to Studied Strike.

Relevant to all precision damage being negated by concealment or to only certain types of it being negated by concealment?

The latter, IMO, since of two adjacent abilities only one has it. You'd think it would be either both or neither if it were universal.

However, this is slightly off-topic, and I made a thread to get this FAQ'd and discuss it, so I'd suggest continuing this over there.

I could have sworn I saw a PDF for this for sale on Friday (June 13), but I didn't get it since I'm notorious for changing characters in the middle of campaigns/adventures and I didn't want the temptation. Was I hallucinating or was a PDF actually for sale (possibly by mistake)?

I am hoping for some serious gunslinger and magus love in this book

I could have sworn I saw a PDF for this for sale on Friday (June 13), but I didn't get it since I'm notorious for changing characters in the middle of campaigns/adventures and I didn't want the temptation. Was I hallucinating or was a PDF actually for sale (possibly by mistake)?

I also saw a link to purchase a pdf a few days ago. I thought it was weird but figured it was a poorly-labelled "preorder the pdf" link. Now that it's disappeared, I wonder if I missed my chance for an illicit sneak peek! :-D

I think the link you saw was for the playtest document?

God I just wanna sleep and wake up when this comes out.

Any chance we can get archetypes for these?

• Bards with no spells but other social and buffing abilities
  
• Cavaliers with no mounts or other pets that focus on teamwork and inspiration
  
• Summoners who get more evolutions instead of spells