Quick stat block clarifiaction.

[Philip Snyder]

What exactly does "Do not list abilities that appear in the Universal Monster Rules (darkvision, grab, incorporeal, rend, and so on)." cover? Are class abilities part of that also? If I made a cleric, do I need to explain the rules of channel energy?

[Turin the Mad]

NChance wrote:

What exactly does "Do not list abilities that appear in the Universal Monster Rules (darkvision, grab, incorporeal, rend, and so on)." cover? Are class abilities part of that also? If I made a cleric, do I need to explain the rules of channel energy?

Good question - I would presume that abilities listed in the PF Beta rules that function as same, including anything detailed in the SRD that is not covered in the Beta text and web enhancements, need only be listed by name, such as channel energy.

[Eric Morton]

The channel energy rules appear in the combat chapter, not the classes chapter, so I'd assume you don't need to reprint them when writing a cleric stat block.

On the other hand, I did notice that cleric stat blocks in a Pathfinder Society scenario from a few months back included the full rules for cleric domain granted powers in cleric stat blocks.

Given that, I erred on the side of including rules. I figured it would be easier for an editor to delete something that was included than cut-and-paste something that wasn't.

[Sean K Reynolds]

Most people erred on the side of including descriptions of class abilities. That's not a problem, and we didn't penalize anyone for it.

FYI, we don't normally reprint class abilities unless they're particularly convoluted. Sneak attack, channel energy, and so on usually aren't fully described because they're straightforward--you just put the "short stats" version in the stat block, like

Special Attacks sneak attack +2d6

I can see describing more class abilities than normal in a PFS stat block because the GM might have limited prep time and repeating new Beta rules can be helpful.