
Kirth Gersen |

Are these supposed to be the same thing. My assumption is yes as otherwise (if using diminishing returns) a level 1 commoner / expert could restore (which could be interpreted as re-grow) a missing limb 1/20 attempts which while humorous also offends my sensibilities.
Re-attach limb should be trained only, 16+ ranks. The non-class-skill function should really still be an option (with a lower DC) but only cover stuff like fitting someone with a hook for a hand, or a peg-leg, or whatever.
The fact that the bounded accuracy result for DC 40 is 15 + 25/2 = 27 is purely coincidence, btw; the DC 27 under the trained skill was derived as DC 20 + level of the restoration spell.

Kirth Gersen |

Let's see here...Soulcrafting: I'm confused on how much Mojo/Numen a soul gives, is it maximum/minimum/par?
Also how does one obtain souls outside of soul trapping magic or trade? I assume live sacrifice is acceptable (this strikes me as a referee discretion question).
Souls: Because souls contain numen in their own right, it is sometimes possible to exchange souls trapped in gems for favors, wishes, or magic items (night hags in particular are known to traffic in souls)―or to use the souls themselves as numen in magical items (using the Soulcrafting feat). However, only half of the numen of a dead creature can be harvested from its soul (this destroys the soul). In addition, if the dead creature has outstanding numen invested in the form of magic items, latent spells, etc., subtract that total from the creature’s before calculating the harvestable total (i.e., a portion of the creature’s soul is held in each of these items and spells). It is always considered an evil act to traffic in souls.
Yeah, I can see that's ambiguous, in terms of wording. The assumption was that you'd be trafficking in NPC souls, so "minimum," rather than PC "par," would be the appropriate value. I'll clarify the wording.
As far as sacrificing someone, their soul typically gets released that way -- presumably, when you sacrifice someone to a demon-god or something, that entity either shows up (or sends an empowered emissary) to collect the soul before it goes to wherever it's trying to get to -- like the whippoorwills in HPL's "Dunwich Horror." To use the soul for Soulcrafting, you'd need to use trap the soul.

Kirth Gersen |

My problem is that i'm currently reffing an evil game (Way of the Wicked) and, I'm concerned that a mass harvesting of souls may be induced.
I'm fine with mass soul harvesting but i fear allowing them to break their Mojo/Numen cap will create a situation where they are significantly more powerful than they should be (this remind's me of blood money in a lot of ways honestly).
It's assumed that pretty much everyone in the campaign world is a 1st level NPC -- certainly when it comes to mass harvesting, you're looking at a village of peasants. So each one nets you a whopping 0 numen. If you find a family of CR 3 ogres, you're still only pulling in 825 numen each, x 16 max = 13,200. At 17th level (the earliest you'll be able to do this, because you need trap the soul), that's like 2.5% of your max. And how many ogre tribes are there, anyway? And you have to keep them all alive and captive while the next one waits its turn.
That said, I'd probably set a fraction of a point of numen for a 1st level NPC, so that you can end up with scenarios where some BBEG wants to sacrifice and entire nation in order to fuel some insane crafting project.

Scavion |

I may have uploaded my folder of errata updated Kirthfinder documents with editable and pdf versions to a filesharing website. Is there any kind of forum rule preventing me from putting a link in my profile?
My next quest is figuring out a decent format to start converting the bestiary in an easy to read fashion.

Kirth Gersen |

My next quest is figuring out a decent format to start converting the bestiary in an easy to read fashion.
If you hold off a year or so, I'll have a Kirthfinder Bestiary ready, with actual rules for creating monsters from scratch that consist of more than just matching some target numbers, and existing monsters from PF, 3.5, 3.0, 2e, and 1e converted.

Kirth Gersen |

I might have to start releasing it piecemeal, then... animals, plants, vermin, constructs, monstrous humanoids, magical beasts, demons, and devils are done. Oozes, fey, dragons, and some of the other outsiders are giving me headaches.
Actually, dragons are pretty simple, except that none of the CRs come out right, because you can't give a critter d12 HD, full BAB, full spellcasting progression, improved attributes, improved natural armor, and a bunch of other stuff and then turn around and pretend 1 HD of that isn't worth at least a PC class level, in terms of CR.

Caedwyr |
1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Speaking as a person with less GM experience, I would prefer to have the CR of dragons/outsiders etc reflect their actual capabilities and be consistent in how they are applied compared to other creatures/NPCs. This would make it easier to use them in encounters that I design because it doesn't have a hidden assumption that they are going to be used as a solo monster.
If you want to make it easier for a GM to use as a solo monster, maybe a general rule or template could be designed to help turn a creature/NPC into an appropriate solo monster fight. The PF system already has problems in encounter design for solo fights. Enemies are either too powerful and wipe the floor with the players if they aren't holding the idiot ball, or they are overwhelmed by the action economy.
If you look at how other games treat solo enemy fights, they normally have padded HP, more actions, and attacks/moves that put pressure on the entire party, but not high enough damage/threat that they can one-shot party members. Then again, many games also make their solo enemies hold the idiot ball and not use their abilities to the fullest. Personally, I've always found encounters that involve multiple enemies, terrain, and hazards to be much more interesting and satisfying.
For enemies that normally come in groups, I can see a potential problem in the other direction. Solo they are weaker than normal, but group synergy can raise their threat level above what multiple monsters/npcs would normally provide. I'm guessing you have some sort of adjustment factor to the CR calculations, but if you don't, a tool such as this would make it much easier for GMs to design encounters and have the expected difficulty levels.

Arrius |
Creating and detailing monster 'classes' based off creature type and quantifying/standardizing universal monster abilities would help in making standard monster rules.
For instance, do dragons truly have full spellcasting, or do they actually have 3/4, and can 'purchase' an increase to spellcasting? Not all dragons can fly (see linnorms) despite having the dragon type, but such dragons have special abilities. Maybe the Linnorms exchanged one ability for another.
This will also help standardizing issues such as dragon 'age templates', and overarching issues such as natural armor, inconsistencies in how attack forms work, and monster abilities that function too similar to warrant being different abilities at all.
I previously proposed that spell failure be unified and tied to ACP (5% spell failure per point), with some classes gaining reductions to existing Spell Failure--such as clerics (who would gain 25% reduction if the spell is divine, allowing them to use armors with up to -4 ACP, or +5 armor, usually medium armor).
On similar notes:
Kirth, have you considered removing references to copyrighted subjects (or keeping them hinted and appealing to fair use) while starting a kickstarter for Kirthfinder as a third-party Pathfinder overhaul product?

Kirth Gersen |
2 people marked this as a favorite. |

Creating and detailing monster 'classes' based off creature type and quantifying/standardizing universal monster abilities would help in making standard monster rules.
That's pretty much what I spent my (minimal) free time in 2015 doing.
I previously proposed that spell failure be unified and tied to ACP (5% spell failure per point), with some classes gaining reductions to existing Spell Failure--such as clerics (who would gain 25% reduction if the spell is divine, allowing them to use armors with up to -4 ACP, or +5 armor, usually medium armor).
I'm still thinking about this. If the math can be made to work out, cost-wise, I'd be tempted.
Kirth, have you considered removing references to copyrighted subjects (or keeping them hinted and appealing to fair use) while starting a kickstarter for Kirthfinder as a third-party Pathfinder overhaul product?
Considered and rejected. I have no time or patience for that. More importantly, I don't want money for what I'm doing. I have a job that I like, and don't want another one. I just wanted to say, "here's how you can make PF work for your home group -- if I can do it, anyone can!"

Arrius |
That's pretty much what I spent my (minimal) free time in 2015 doing.
You might have run into some problems--mostly with standardization. I had a few myself realizations you might benefit from:
1. Undead and Outsiders work best as templates and not creature types.
2. Monster abilities that drain and damage attributes scale well with Hit Dice, which does not necessitate a change other than making all abilities scale off the magic system.
3. Natural armor scaling. I opted to allow certain creatures to (assume) natural armor, with a bonus up to Constitution modifier (in lieu with the Mountain Dwarf ability), which allows a measure of flexibility.
4. Natural attack rules come back with a vengeance.
The benefits of a unified monster system is clear, of course: it balances summon monster spells' ability to scale by heightening spells, and polymorph mechanics can revert to pre-Pathfinder format (dumpster diving for now-balanced critters).
If you're interested, I can throw a Word document your way, which focuses on monster creation, which might help with your own efforts.
Considered and rejected. I have no time or patience for that. More importantly, I don't want money for what I'm doing. I have a job that I like, and don't want another one. I just wanted to say, "here's how you can make PF work for your home group -- if I can do it, anyone can!"
Be that as it may, the majority of changes in Kirthfinder go too deep to remain modular enough for most home games.

Kirth Gersen |

Be that as it may, the majority of changes in Kirthfinder go too deep to remain modular enough for most home games.
That's true. The whole project started when I said, "Ya know, wouldn't it be nice if the fighter's armor training and so one were choices, analogous to rogue talents?" It sort of snowballed from there. So, yeah, ca. 2009 it was still quite modular -- port in a replacement ranger class, or try out scaling combat feats as an optional rule. Gradually, through evolution, problem-solving, and consolidation of sub-systems, it ended up being its own thing, especially because the core Pathfinder game seemed to be headed in an opposite direction.

Talonhawke |

Arrius wrote:Be that as it may, the majority of changes in Kirthfinder go too deep to remain modular enough for most home games.That's true. The whole project started when I said, "Ya know, wouldn't it be nice if the fighter's armor training and so one were choices, analogous to rogue talents?" It sort of snowballed from there. So, yeah, ca. 2009 it was still quite modular -- port in a replacement ranger class, or try out scaling combat feats as an optional rule. Gradually, through evolution, problem-solving, and consolidation of sub-systems, it ended up being its own thing, especially because the core Pathfinder game seemed to be headed in an opposite direction.
Ehh I like it. Honestly I love the inherent flexibility provided even if I'm always DMing and haven't ever gotten to try out my ideas for it.

Firewarrior44 |

New question!
Flurry of blows and monks.
So in two weapon fighting it says a monk can preform a "so called 'flurry of blows'" Is this intended to function as the advanced fighter talent of the same name? (Full Str to substitute attacks for manuvers?)
Or does it just let the monk attack with a single weapon multiple times?
I want to say it's intended that the monk attains flurry of blows (the talent) in some manner innately but I could be wrong it might be nostalgia talking. And monks do have force damage on attacks + weapon form damage to compensate.
For example, an 11th level fighter with this talent and the Improved Two-Weapon Fighting feat, armed with a longsword and a shield, could attack with the longsword at +11/+11/+11 and gain the shield bonus to AC, or could instead make a flurry of six attacks with the longsword at +9 each (but lose the shield bonus to AC in the meantime, as a flurry of blows is treated as two-weapon fighting).

Kirth Gersen |

The fighter's flurry is TWF, except with one weapon.
The monk's flurry is identical, except he/she can mix'n'match one or more weapons.
Re: Trading attacks for maneuvers, I hope that will be cleared up very nicely if I can ever finish the draft Combat chapter I'm working on. Until then, assume that a pair of TWF attacks = 1 maneuver.

Knight Magenta |

Arrius wrote:Be that as it may, the majority of changes in Kirthfinder go too deep to remain modular enough for most home games.That's true. The whole project started when I said, "Ya know, wouldn't it be nice if the fighter's armor training and so one were choices, analogous to rogue talents?" It sort of snowballed from there. So, yeah, ca. 2009 it was still quite modular -- port in a replacement ranger class, or try out scaling combat feats as an optional rule. Gradually, through evolution, problem-solving, and consolidation of sub-systems, it ended up being its own thing, especially because the core Pathfinder game seemed to be headed in an opposite direction.
So funny story; I am basically doing this in reverse: grabbing parts from Kirthfinder and bringing them to PF. I found kirthfinder a few years ago, but it was always daunting to get my group to use it 'cause as time has gone by our appetite for learning a new systems has dried up. I've been inspired by your rules to start adding scaling feats to our group's house-rules and so far it's been very well received. That along with Path of War from DSP has made martial characters really dynamic.
I'm also in love with your weapon proficiency system, but it is harder to work into vanilla Pathfinder without doing lots of extra work.

Firewarrior44 |

I had a thought. Polling for opinions and or insight into the possible ballance repercussions.
It's in regards to monk, specifically their lack of the ability to innately flurry (two weapon fight) without spending a feat on two weapon fighting. It's quite the iconic ability so it seems strange (to me) that it's lacking innately.
I was looking through weapon proficiency tiers and noticed a few weapons give two-weapon fighting with exotic proficiency. All of the weapons are monk themed (Quarterstaff, Three-Section Staff and, Lajatang). So i'm thinking why not add two weapon fighting as an exotic proficiency bonus to unarmed strikes?
That way a monk is saved a feat and retains their ability to flurry innately. Would this be too strong? Although it would affect classes other than monk it would do so more or less uniformly.
I have a player who's a little underwhelmed by the KF monk (he feels like it should be better at the fighter at punching things despite me re-iterating hitting things to death is the fighters job regardless of how it's done).
Although he seemed a bit sore from the gutting of the number of Sutra's in the errata. Which wasn't immediately apparent as he had an un-errata'd copy of the class so it was a bit of an unfortunate surprise. So it might be the longing for what was.

Kirth Gersen |

1. If ki attack, weapon form, and unarmed mastery somehow aren't enough for him, tell him about ki powers, specifically strikes that add to damage. Couple one of those with Vital Strike and you'll be one-shotting monsters with a single punch, so you don't need to flurry.
2. If you absolutely must have flurry of blows, you do get combat style feats... use one or more of those.
3. You actually get more sutra-y goodness after the errata, rather than less, because the scaling benefits save you from having to purchase "sutra chains."

Firewarrior44 |

1) I totally agree that monks get nice things (the passive damage is amazing and a reason i'm hesitant to give more attacks for free). More attacks is also generally very strong due to you being able to 1/3 move and full attack (Which can potentially be ridiculous distances with monk speed/mobility).
2) I also noticed He also has the option to use his temple weapon to get twf for free with say a quarterstaff. I think it's just a combination of nostalgia and comparing directly to the fighter's martial prowess (envy).
3) Ah, That makes sense on the Sutra's. The document we were using included both the verbiage for automatic scaling (on top of one every other level). So it's a Nerf from that but really getting effectively 4 times as many talents as other classes is defiantly unfair.
Thank's for the insight!

Firewarrior44 |

Yea 2 Level's in Fighter did seem really good. I Actually suggested it to him. The +1 to stats for combat feat requirements, full monk damage scaling, another feat, and weapon training and aptitude. The Training is big as it changes the 1/2 level damage to racial instead of competence so it stacks with specialization.
The only thing you really miss out on is Ki power progression.

Arachnofiend |

Has anyone made any attempts at converting Paizo AP's to work with Kirthfinder? I'm kind of considering running a game of this (because there's basically no way I'll be able to convince someone to run it for me lol) but I'm not prepared to do a homebrew narrative as well as relearn Pathfinder. Just wondering if anyone's tackled the issue before and what problems they may have faced.

Kirth Gersen |

I write most of my own adventures, so they're pre-converted, as it were.
Regarding APs, I've converted:
Skull & Shackles is going well; the only thing I really had to do was remove the railroad-y parts and turn the first two modules into one big sandbox instead.
Savage Tide is a PBP and it seems to have pretty much stalled out due to players not posting.
"Hook Mountain Massacre" was to playtest the new Barbarian class. Needless to say, we were happy with the results.
I'm especially proud of how "Skinsaw Murders" came out, but I'd woven it so seemlessly into the existing campaign that some of the players who'd run through Rise of the Runlords before didn't even recognize it.

Firewarrior44 |

I'm Running WoTW right now, we just finished Book 1. We had 1 (almost 2 TPK's). I attribute that to fighters being a hell of a lot stronger (yay) and the module likes to make use of them for most of the "boss" NPC's.
Overall though the actual process of converting has been painless (although it's a fair amount of work).

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Two questions:
Any advice and suggestions for building a shadow themed rogue, with some magic and other shadowy abilities, using Kirthfinder? I have a character who basic theme is "shadows are a girl's best friend", inspired by a song.
Also, any chance I may PM you Kirth involving a campaign I am seeking advice on? It being my first and I am trying to figure out how best to play out the ideas/plot hooks I have dangled in front of my players to start the adventure.

Firewarrior44 |

Magical Talent Array would let you get a host of darkness themed spell-like abilities and, [Darkness] feats especially Gloom attack if you're going to be a rogue.
I'm not sure how well multi-classing with summoner would work out but you might be able to replicate / create a facsimile of the shadow dancers shadow companion using the Eidolon.
If not there's always leadership. (although for a Shadow command undead might be necessary. I'm actually not sure on that. I play with the assumption that Leadership can be any sentient being alive or undead)

Kirth Gersen |

1. Any advice and suggestions for building a shadow themed rogue, with some magic and other shadowy abilities, using Kirthfinder? I have a character who basic theme is "shadows are a girl's best friend", inspired by a song.2. Also, any chance I may PM you Kirth involving a campaign I am seeking advice on? It being my first and I am trying to figure out how best to play out the ideas/plot hooks I have dangled in front of my players to start the adventure.
1.(a) Remember that rogues can pick Shadow Hand maneuvers from the Tome of Battle as skill tricks.
(b) Alternatively, multiclass with Sorcerer (Tenebrous bloodline) and trade in your skill tricks for theurgy with Arcane Trickster.(c) If none of that is enough, take a couple of levels in Shade (Ch 2); a shade/rogue was specifically intended as a KF replacement for the Shadowdancer PrC.
2. Sure! Feel free.

Firewarrior44 |

Hey, Kirth some questions about item pricing.
1) How would one go about pricing the feat "Feat mastery" with Numen?
A Flat 2,000 gold seems incorrect.
Would you buy up to the "base level", I.e to boost a feat to 6th level you would pay 2000x1('base' level) = 2000 nu. To get 11th level 2000x6 = 12000 nu.
Or would you look at what bonuses the feat you are mastering would give and price according to that? For example feat mastery on weapon focus/specialization at level 1 5000 nu (+1 competence to damage) + 5000 nu (+1 competence to damage) = 10,000 nu
2) Question about bonus pricing in general. Is there a rule of thumb for reducing the cost of a bonus based on it's situationalness? For example would the competence bonus of Weapon focus be cheaper as it only applies to attacks with a single weapon type? Sorry if I missed the rule for this.

Kirth Gersen |

Hey, Kirth some questions about item pricing.
1) How would one go about pricing the feat "Feat mastery" with Numen?
You would pay for the other 5 levels worth of benefit you're getting, at +2,000 numen per level = +10,000, as you surmised.
An item that allows the user to use a feat is priced based on the prerequisites for use. The base cost is 2,000 numen x the minimum base attack bonus or number of skill ranks, etc. needed to gain the desired feat effects.
This statement, since it's part of the main rule, has precedence over any subsequent shenanigans with synergy or other feats or whatever.

Kirth Gersen |

Is there a rule of thumb for reducing the cost of a bonus based on it's situationalness? For example would the competence bonus of Weapon focus be cheaper as it only applies to attacks with a single weapon type? Sorry if I missed the rule for this.
Critical or Contingent Properties: Weapon property spell effects that activate only on a critical (e.g., the deafness effect of a thundering weapon, or the additional damage dealt by a flaming burst weapon) are priced as use-activated spell effects (see above). However, because the effect occurs only contingent on specific activation conditions, spell duration pricing modifiers do not apply.
All use-activated properties are, in a sense, situational to the item with those properties, so no, every single item in the world doesn't get this discount. And no, you cannot put a situational Weapon Focus on a weapon, because then it isn't situational anymore, is it?

Firewarrior44 |

Ok that makes sense. I noticed In your Description of Pricing Haste the bonus to reflex was reduced by 1/4, as it impacts a single save.
I assume if pricing something like favored a terrain feat (a lot of +2 competence bonuses to skills) A reduction in the cost of each bonus might be fair as they are not always on (only applicable inside the terrain itself).
I also assume that you cannot purchase a feat like favored terrain and choose to "pick and choose" parts of it and have to buy the whole package? In the case of favored terrain Urban you couldn't just pay 2000 nu for the Pass as Local power and not the X thousand nu for all the terrain skill bonuses.

Kirth Gersen |

In theory, you'd have to buy the skill bonuses all separately. However, like you said, if they're limited enough, that requirement can maybe get waived by a generous referee. Likewise, the other abilities (speak with animals for forest terrain, etc.) should really be bought individually as spell effects, per the item pricing rules. So a referee who balked at an item providing a favored terrain for 2,000 numen would have a lot of rules support for that stance.
That said, there's nothing stopping you from buying a speak with animals item, however, if that's the only part of the favored terrain you were interested in. Presumably there's a spell somewhere that would let you pass as a local -- maybe in Races of Destiny or somewhere? Barring that, just buy an enhancement bonus to Perform (acting) and/or Streetwise.

Firewarrior44 |

The terrain in question is Urban. Whose main draw is that it permits you to take 20 on diplomacy checks in a urban environment. When using Diminishing returns this is exceptionally powerful and more or less guarantees success when trying to convince anyone to do something. But it being gated behind 80,000 ish nu means everyone and their mother can't just pickup the feat for a paltry 2k nu

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1.(a) Remember that rogues can pick Shadow Hand maneuvers from the Tome of Battle as skill tricks.
(b) Alternatively, multiclass with Sorcerer (Tenebrous bloodline) and trade in your skill tricks for theurgy with Arcane Trickster.
(c) If none of that is enough, take a couple of levels in Shade (Ch 2); a shade/rogue was specifically intended as a KF replacement for the Shadowdancer PrC.
Wouldn't the Path of War possibly be a better choice to look for maneuvers, or do you have a different view of ToB then many people? I admit I hadn't noticed they could take them as skill tricks. Still if a DM... I mean referee allows this I will look into the Shadow Hand maneuvers.
The multiclass idea could work, mixing the Tenebrous Sorcerer will the Rogue before going into Arcane Trickster... yet at the same time since the Shadowdancer was a path I would pick if this was vanilla Pathfinder. As such I will definitely look into the Shade... what chapter of Kirthfinder is this in?
I will also look into Magical Talent Array, as suggested by
Firewarrior44

Kirth Gersen |

The terrain in question is Urban. Whose main draw is that it permits you to take 20 on diplomacy checks in a urban environment. When using Diminishing returns this is exceptionally powerful and more or less guarantees success when trying to convince anyone to do something. But it being gated behind 80,000 ish nu means everyone and their mother can't just pickup the feat for a paltry 2k nu
That's a very, very good point wrt that particular example. By extension, though (even without worrying about magic item prices, getting that ability (plus others) for a paltry feat is too good to pass up as well, so I need to look at that as a specific loophole that needs to be closed -- maybe something along the lines of
"Additional Terrain Skills: Diplomacy (the skill bonus applies, but not the ability to Take 20); plus Streetwise, and Bluff checks to intimidate crowds."Thanks!

Talonhawke |

Kirth Gersen wrote:1.(a) Remember that rogues can pick Shadow Hand maneuvers from the Tome of Battle as skill tricks.
(b) Alternatively, multiclass with Sorcerer (Tenebrous bloodline) and trade in your skill tricks for theurgy with Arcane Trickster.
(c) If none of that is enough, take a couple of levels in Shade (Ch 2); a shade/rogue was specifically intended as a KF replacement for the Shadowdancer PrC.Wouldn't the Path of War possibly be a better choice to look for maneuvers, or do you have a different view of ToB then many people? I admit I hadn't noticed they could take them as skill tricks. Still if a DM... I mean referee allows this I will look into the Shadow Hand maneuvers.
The multiclass idea could work, mixing the Tenebrous Sorcerer will the Rogue before going into Arcane Trickster... yet at the same time since the Shadowdancer was a path I would pick if this was vanilla Pathfinder. As such I will definitely look into the Shade... what chapter of Kirthfinder is this in?
I will also look into Magical Talent Array, as suggested by
Firewarrior44
Well if your using the whole rules as is then the use of Shadow Hand is a baked in assumption. As far as PoW then I don't really see an issue with working with the Ref to determine if any schools might be availble either in addition to or as a replacement for Shadowhand.