Assume I'm playing a class that doesn't have perception as a class skill, what are my options to make it so?
I know about those:
- multiclassing (d'oh, usually not the option to go)
- "Tomb Raider (Osirion)" trait, but that's only for people from Osirion I guess. Probably only humans.
- Cosmopolitan feat - i guess that's ok, making 2 skills a class skill is basicly 2 Skill Focus for one (and you can stack it with real skill focus if you want) - but feats are usually very limited already.
Assume I'm playing a class that doesn't have perception as a class skill, what are my options to make it so?
I know about those:
- multiclassing (d'oh, usually not the option to go)
- "Tomb Raider (Osirion)" trait, but that's only for people from Osirion I guess. Probably only humans.
- Cosmopolitan feat - i guess that's ok, making 2 skills a class skill is basicly 2 Skill Focus for one (and you can stack it with real skill focus if you want) - but feats are usually very limited already.
Not sure if their are other traits but i am sure your GM could work with you on making one.
If you're playing a home game (as opposed to PFS), talk with your DM about possibly switching skills around - if you can get rid of similarly useful skills as Perception (really useful), you can probably find a balanced approach.
Additionally there are a few campaign-specific traits (i.e. in player guides for APs) that let you make perception a class skill. Possibly your GM allows those, in the right context.
You could just take a Skill Focus Feat in Perception and call it a day. The end result is the same.
Almost, but if i get it as a class skill, I can then take skill focus as well, for even more bonus :)
And if its done with a trait or so, it doesn't take up a feat slot
I don't think it's that bad, Lazar. Skill focus is pretty weak for a feat. A trait is probably your best bet, following by a multi-class, followed by my main suggestion - talk with your DM, and talk about losing class skills you have for others - in this case, Perception.
*passes the munchkin hat*You could just take a Skill Focus Feat in Perception and call it a day. The end result is the same.Almost, but if i get it as a class skill, I can then take skill focus as well, for even more bonus :)
And if its done with a trait or so, it doesn't take up a feat slot
But really it's not that I want to stack it, it's really that I don't want to use a feat, i already have far too few of those.
*passes the munchkin hat*You could just take a Skill Focus Feat in Perception and call it a day. The end result is the same.Almost, but if i get it as a class skill, I can then take skill focus as well, for even more bonus :)
And if its done with a trait or so, it doesn't take up a feat slot
Would you call it a munchkin if it was already a class skill and they played a human and took alertness and skill focus at level one? Its not really that munchkin when you think about it. i mean its perception they don't wanna get jumped
I'm a fan of playing a half-elf with Skill Focus (Perception) and Alertness at 1st level. That's a +7 before even factoring in skill ranks, class skill bonus, traits, or ability modifiers.
Hell, any class that requires Skill Focus at any point in their build is likely well served as a half-elf, but that's just me.
I do wish there were more ways to get it on the skill list, but it's a class skill for...6/11 core classes, which isn't terrible. 8/18 classes overall.
The class skill bonus is nice, but at higher level it gets overshadowed by ranks, magic items, and ability score modifiers.
What? You mean your DM hasn't house ruled that taking Skill Focus automatically makes it a class skill?
That's actually not a terrible way of handling it. It makes the skill focus feat itself less weak, essentially getting a +6 with a skill. Of course, it means it's not as strong for most classes who already get it as a class skill, but not many of those take the feat anyways, and if they do they're trying to get the most out of a certain skill and welcome the +3(+6 at level 10)
It's not the most potent of feats, anyways. The large majority of feats are intended to allow you to do something you couldn't do before. Skill focus simply makes you better at something you could already do.
Of course, a house rule like that would unbalance the other skill feats like Alertness or Persuasive. If they caused both skills to be class skills, they'd be overpowered. If they caused neither, then they'd be underpowered. I think it'd be fair, if you were house ruling that skill focus = class skill, then you could choose one of the two affected skills and make it a class skill.
From an overall balance point of view, it's not too bad. If traits are theoretically half as powerful as a feat, and a trait could make it a class skill with an extra +1, a feat making it a class skill with an extra +3 bonus is slightly weaker than two traits, but with the advantage of scaling upwards at level 10.
Get a diviner in your group and both take the Lookout feat and buy them some Eyes of the Eagle.
Then spend your skill points in something your class is better suited to do. Intelligence based? go knowledge. Charisma based? go diplomacy or bluff. Strength based? spend points on anything that makes you useful outside of combat so you don't get bored during the story bits. Dex based? Acrobatics and slight of hand are nice.
Perception is a very useful stat, but it isn't everything.
Dude,that is nowhere near munchkinism. Spending a feat on it when you have much better things to do with them is stupid-especially if you can get it from a trait.
If you would reread the posts in the conversation up until your response, I have to think you'd feel a little silly for completely missing the point.
Do people keep on forgetting that skill focus gived an additional +3 at 10 ranks?
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Do people keep on forgetting that skill focus gived an additional +3 at 10 ranks?Probably not, but that's not enough to satisfy the OP, he wants more numbers and he wants them presumably at 1st.
Or maybe s/he has a really poor wisdom and doesn't like sucking at Perception? I'm dealing with that with my fighter right now. It's the most used skill by ALL CLASSES in the game, it pays to be good at it.
It's not munchkinism to want to be the best you can be at 1st level. For all we know, their party may not have a 'good perception' person and they want to be good at it.
As an aside, I think all classes should have Perception as a class skill (and commonly house-rule so) because your class shouldn't dictate how good your senses are.
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There are classes that naturally train in perception.. rouge, ranger, etc... Wizard's clerics, etc. are the trope opposite of those classes. and that's why they don't have perception as a class skill.
Of course, the class that should lean most heavily toward having Perception as a class skill is notably the one without it.
Shouldn't your night watchmen have Perception standard? And yet, for the poor Fighter, it isn't a class skill. :(
It is strange that the one skill players are most often are required to roll by the GM is the one skill many classes don't have.
Given how crucially important it seems to be, I don't think it's "munchkin" at all to want to acquire it no matter what class you're in.
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My PbP GM okayed a trait something like this:
Eye for Danger
A natural aptitude for dungeon-crawling--and perhaps a touch of paranoia--makes you acutely aware of your surroundings. Perception is a class skill for you with a +1 trait bonus.
I was happy about the house rule, as my sanity-blasted abberant sorceror has a Wisdom 8 and otherwise would have trouble finding his hat on his head.
If your GM allows player-designed magic items, they offer another possibility for cheap boosts to Perception. A +3 competence bonus item should only cost 900 gold (or half that, with a PC crafting the item). So if you make it through a couple of levels without the bonus, you can probably boost the skill with a magic item. Even a +1 (or +2) bonus can help, and it's a steal for 100/50 (or 400/200) gp.
Noone has said they want to outdo anyone or get everylast digit out of the skill the OP wants the +3 for it being class yes but they never stated they wanted to take focus and alertness and shoot for a 9+Wis at first level they want to be on par with the guy who gets if for free and they want to use a trait something everyone has 2 of to get it.
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I wonder if Lazar calls the fighter that takes Power Attack at 1st level instead of Endurance and Run a munchkin too.
I AM willing to make sacrifices. I was just looking for smart ways to do it, because I don't want to spend a feat on it if there's an easier way to do it, I don't think that's munchkining. YMMV.
There are traits to make nearly every skill a class skill. Diplomacy, Bluff, most Knowledge skills, Survival, Swim, all that is no problem. There's enough "Choose one of those skills, you get a +1 and its class skill" traits that do that.
However I only found the one I mentioned for perception and it's a faction/regional trait, so yeah I was wondering if there were others in other books.
Also I got 14 wis, so I didn't dump it completely.
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I've always objected to the FIghter and Paladins not having Perception as a class skill. Both have low Wisdom often (likely 10), have few skill points to spend, the most important skill being perfeption and they cannot have it? Guard duty is a sad time for the protectors of the group.
As a Paladin the safety of innocents and my group are the most important, its embaressing that I cannot actually notice anything to protect them from. Sleeping at night with me on guard the whole team could be murdered in their sleep without me even noticing!
The easy way around this for non paladins is just to take Abdar as your god to get the religious trait. Sadly a Paladin is not so easy to get round poor perception because Abdar is a sucky god to worship :)
1) Pick a class which has a feature giving you the Class skill Perception. Like the Draconic Sorcerer and Accursed. The Oracle has Battle, Heavens, Time, and Stargazer. The Cavalier has Order of the Dragon.
2) Muliclass or pick a class that has Perception as class skill or gains it through a feature. Adding to the list above that would be Rogue, Bard, Inquisitor, Alchemist, Barbarian, Druid, Monk, or Ranger.
3) Pick Prestige class that gives you Perceptions like the Arcane Archer, Arcane Trickster, Assassin, Dragon Disciple, Dualist, Pathfinder Chronicler, Shadow Dancer, Battle Herald, Horizon Walker, Master Spy, Nature Warden or Stalwart Defender. Though just qualifying for some of these prestige class will already get you Perception as class skill.
4) Pick a trait like "Eyes and Ears of the city" tying Abadar into you history somehow. You don't have to be cleric or a worshiper. You could have been a guard at the temple for example, there for the money. Or any LN god really.
Kind of off on a tangent, but I think Perception is too good of a skill.
I remember people going out of their way to wrangle Spot into a character that wouldn't otherwise have it in 3.5, and rolling Search and Listen into the same skill's just made it worse. You'd have to be a little crazy (mechanically speaking) in most games to not max out your ranks of Perception even if it wasn't a class skill, and that seems like a huge red flag to me.
I've always objected to the FIghter and Paladins not having Perception as a class skill. Both have low Wisdom often (likely 10), have few skill points to spend, the most important skill being perfeption and they cannot have it? Guard duty is a sad time for the protectors of the group.
As a Paladin the safety of innocents and my group are the most important, its embaressing that I cannot actually notice anything to protect them from. Sleeping at night with me on guard the whole team could be murdered in their sleep without me even noticing!
The easy way around this for non paladins is just to take Abdar as your god to get the religious trait. Sadly a Paladin is not so easy to get round poor perception because Abdar is a sucky god to worship :)
I rarely ever see fighter with 10 Wisdom, it's usually 12 at least 14 at most. Fighter get owned to much if they don't have a Wisdom bonus. Now the Paladin, I've seen that stat dumped to 7 as the Paladin has good Will Save.
As for that trait, it's only a LN god you have to pick. Abadar comes to mind first but there is whole list of less deities in the campaign guide and different gods for different settings. As well you don't have be tied tightly to the religion. It just fits in you background somewhere.
I don't think it's that bad, Lazar. Skill focus is pretty weak for a feat. A trait is probably your best bet, following by a multi-class, followed by my main suggestion - talk with your DM, and talk about losing class skills you have for others - in this case, Perception.Yes's I call it munchkinism. He doesn't want to play a class that's supposed to have it as a class skill and he's whining about spending a feat which by my opinion is anything BUT weak. He's trying to jack his numbers up and isn't willing to make the normal sacrifices to do so.
That could not be more wrong.
Based on my experiences as a GM, perception is so easy to maximize in PF that it really is stupid. The Abadar trait above (+4 bonus to a class without perception) + half-elf (+5 bonus (eventually +8 bonus), SF + KS) is a massive combination for perception. At first level it's not uncommon to see half-elf fighters walking around with +14 perception (1 rank + 3 class + 2 Wis + 2 keen senses + 3 SF + 2 Alertness + 1 trait).
As written, eyes of the eagle is simply too good. If it said "a +5 competence bonus to sight-based perception checks", I'd be ok. But as written it gives a flat +5 to *all* perception checks. That seems kind of silly. Even if a GM were to divide bonuses from lens of detection to search-type perception checks and the eyes of the eagle bonus to sight-only checks, keeping track of what bonus goes with what is cumbersome. So the end result is a level 4 fighter walking around with +24 perception (4 rank + 3 class + 2 Wis + 2 keen senses + 3 SF + 2 Alertness + 2 sharp senses + 1 trait + 5 eagle). . . which is good enough to find a CR 20 trap by taking 10.
[So here's the problem then, do you have something to propose?
I'm leaning towards thinking it should cost two or maybe even three skill points per rank, as the easiest houserule fix.
Really, the only kind of character that I think arguably *needs* to keep a maxed/high Perception to perform their primary function would be a trap-oriented rogue, and they have Trapfinding to help with those rolls if for whatever reason they can't afford double skill points.
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So here's the problem then, do you have something to propose? Perception is considered valuable because it's number one use is the roll for surprise. A surprise mechanic has always been part of the game since the original books. People look forways to max out perception because they don't want to sit out the surprise round being targets? In order to change it's value, you'd have to come up with alternate ways to handle the various mechanics that Perception is used for, mainly Surprise and Search.Kind of off on a tangent, but I think Perception is too good of a skill.
I like the old-school method. Surprise is a straight-up roll, no modifiers.
Of course, my combat philosophy is that the absolute best answer to the question, "Who goes first?" is, in all honesty, "I don't care."
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I'm leaning towards thinking it should cost two or maybe even three skill points per rank, as the easiest houserule fix.
Really, the only kind of character that I think arguably *needs* to keep a maxed/high Perception to perform their primary function would be a trap-oriented rogue, and they have Trapfinding to help with those rolls if for whatever reason they can't afford double skill points.
I really dont see the point of taxing Perception. If players feel it is a 'must have' to the point they go investing feats, traits, etc into it... well, thats a pretty significant tax already. And if they put that much into it, they deserve not to have their returns marginalized.
I really dont see the point of taxing Perception. If players feel it is a 'must have' to the point they go investing feats, traits, etc into it... well, thats a pretty significant tax already. And if they put that much into it, they deserve not to have their returns marginalized.
Among people I play with, generally:
People will NOT throw feats at Perception (other than half-elf skill focus, sometimes), but pretty much everyone will give it a skill point every level.
In 3.X doing that with Spot wasn't the greatest idea; now, mechanically, I think in most games you'd be a little crazy not to do that.
In 3.X doing that with Spot wasn't the greatest idea; now, mechanically, I think in most games you'd be a little crazy not to do that.
But if you're willing to pay for it, why not? Being able to skill a character however you like is one of the great advantages of pathfinder; even crossclass skills can be leveled viably by anyone.
The fact that Perception is the most broadly applicable seems reasonable to me; different skills are not equally valuable; for instance, consider that a rank in Stealth and a rank in Profession (baker) have the same cost to a character. Are they equally valuable? No. Is that necessarily a problem? I dont think so.
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The fact that Perception is the most broadly applicable seems reasonable to me; different skills are not equally valuable; for instance, consider that a rank in Stealth and a rank in Profession (baker) have the same cost to a character. Are they equally valuable? No. Is that necessarily a problem? I dont think so.
I don't think all skills need to be equally valuable to all characters; I do think when one skill is better than all other skills for all characters (and Perception pretty much is that), it's a problem.
I kind of like Pathfinder's wide-open skill system; on the other hand, it does trivialize the value of the skill-heavy classes. I think if you could take a feat and get full wizard casting or even just full base attack regardless of what your class levels were, we'd call that broken, yet the skill character farm has been given away and we're just sort of shrugging at it.