Missing Alchemist Discovery?

[TeShen]

I remember seeing a discovery on the PFSRD. I believe it was titled Potency or some such and added an extra 1d6 to bomb damage. I cannot now find it in the APG or the PFSRD. Was it a discovery that was only in the playtest and then removed before printing? Or did it never exist and I'm just remembering incorrectly?

[Jadeite]

It existed.

Final Playtest wrote:

Potent bombs: The damage dealt by an alchemist’s bomb increases by 1d6. An alchemist can select this discovery more than once, its effects stack.

[Carbon D. Metric]

It certainly existed but is was taken out prior to the final release for three reasons.

Poor flavor. Let's face it, this is the kind of discovery that really cant be chalked up as more than a mechanical change for the purpose of making your character more powerful. Which is the second reason it was taken out because it was too powerful compared to the other discoveries. Which following logic reveals the third reason, because it ended up being a mandatory discovery because of how good it was, some people call this a "power tax" because by not spending your limited resources taking it you were just doing yourself a disservice.

[Ice Titan]

Level 20 Alchemist. Every feat is extra discovery except for the first two (Precise Shot and Point Blank Shot). Every discovery is potency, except for one, which is fast bombs.

+15/+15/+10/+5 against touch plus Dex (likely 22~, so +21/+21/+16/+11) 27d6+27+int mod. Int mod is likely 24 or 26, too. So, +8.

So assuming all of those hit (and almost all of them will) you could be looking at about 108d6+108+32 in a full round action.

So like avg 518 damage. Oh, and +4 from point blank shot.

Had to cut it off because of abuse like this.

[Abraham spalding]

Ice Titan is missing a few points -- first off the +108? Doesn't happen on the primary target.

Secondly the splash has a reflex save for half.

Also that's spread over multiple hits meaning that it's not a damage total but seperate rolls of 27d6+15 (maximum int is 38 so maximum bonus is 14 plus point blank = 15).

So up to 3 attacks that deal 27d6+15 damage but is all fire damage (at level 20? Might as well say "I'm not doing damage") and you have how many bombs per day? Yeah not enough to keep it up as long as others can keep up their tricks.

Basically put it "looks" powerful -- until you actually look at it.

Average damage per hit? 109 fire damage on one target, with 42 damage on those within splash -- if they aren't completely immune to fire in the first place.

Final point -- that's at level 20. The fighter is doing what damage at this point? The wizard can cast what at this point? The cleric is doing what at this point? Paladin? Monk? Etc etc. This isn't all that amazing.

[0gre]

I suspect it was removed because it was determined that alchemists have no trouble dishing out plenty of damage. They also added some alternate sources of bonus damage for them, gnome and half orc racial abilities both bump damage a bit and gnomes get bonus bombs.

They also nerfed sticky bomb quite a bit I suspect for similar reasons.