I have to agree with the OP on this one. I was honestly looking forward to this book being a "non-spellcaster" book, giving full attention to combat options without the use of spells. and giving new options "archetypes" for half caster classes giving up spells for combat abilities.
I have yet to see the inbalance between casters and non-casters be truly addresses. just stop and look at the amount of material, its simple casters have more material to use.
I for one would love Paizo to come out with a Non-Spellcaster book, dedicated to characters who dont use magic.
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Combat Expertise is pretty important if you want to stand any chance of keeping your AC relevant as you head up the levels. Sure, some people choose to simply ignore AC as a lost cause (and, often, whine about it too...) as their characters level, but there's no reason a well-designed combat-character, especially a Feat-heavy Fighter, can't keep their AC at an acceptable level - and Combat Expertise, being the only AC bonus Feat which levels with your character, is an important part of that.
Seriously - take it, use it... don't look back...
IMHO, as always...
I for one have played at least 2 fighter characters who survived first level with nothing more than power attack and a quarterstaff. No armor, no fancy weapons, just a good strength score and learning good positioning.
And both characters kicked serious ass at first level.
Power attack is tres awesome!
New martial moves introduced as feats:
"Oh cool, I really want this for my fighter, I'll have to spend a feat on it once I'm able! After I'm done getting some useless feats so I meet the prerequisites, of course. And that means I can't get some of the other new cool moves. Decisions decisions..."
New wizard spells introduced:
"Oh cool, new spells! I guess I'll have to spend some money on it, and not extremely limited resources such as feats!"
New cleric/druid spell introduced:
"Oh cool, new spells I can use!"
New wizard spells introduced:
"Oh cool, new spells! I guess I'll have to spend some money on it, and not extremely limited resources such as feats! I'm glad I'm not a sorcerer!"
Amended.
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Of course Fighters have the oft-forgotten Class Feature of being able to swap out bonus combat Feats every four levels. I imagine that, being oft-forgotten, it's not a Feature which many will rate highly (especially when theory-crafting character builds), but it can be very nice in actual game-play. IMHO...
Of course Fighters have the oft-forgotten Class Feature of being able to swap out bonus combat Feats every four levels. I imagine that, being oft-forgotten, it's not a Feature which many will rate highly (especially when theory-crafting character builds), but it can be very nice in actual game-play. IMHO...
Still have to meet prerequistes for the swaps which not only slows the exchange for trees by tying up twice the feats to swap over but doesn't get around the problem of long trees of feats that non fighters can barely afford.
This is what I mean. And the easiest fix for this is 'Fighter Strikes' or 'Fighter Talents' or just keep calling them Fighter-only feats.
Screw long Preqs. Just tie it to fighter level.
Let them select Rolibar's Gambit, Iron Heart Surge, Thicket of Blades, Hunter Stance, Adamantine Hurracane with thier Fighter Bonus Feats.
None of those need to be magical either.
Pretty much everything from the Iron Heart, Dimond Mind and Tiger Claw schools is all Ex abilities.
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In before "Get Your Weaboo Wuxia Asian Crap Out Of My Pristine, Realistic Western Fighters".
Why does it have to be Wuxia Asain Crap. Europe and the middle east has Plenty of Martial Arts that are created there. TOB didn't have a very Asian feel to me.
No reason Fighter Talents has to have any Asian fluff. Plenty of Cool stuff from Germany, Russia, Israel, Bazil etc.
This is what I mean. And the easiest fix for this is 'Fighter Strikes' or 'Fighter Talents' or just keep calling them Fighter-only feats.
Screw long Preqs. Just tie it to fighter level.
Let them select Rolibar's Gambit, Iron Heart Surge, Thicket of Blades, Hunter Stance, Adamantine Hurracane with thier Fighter Bonus Feats.
None of those need to be magical either.
Pretty much everything from the Iron Heart, Dimond Mind and Tiger Claw schools is all Ex abilities.
I like this idea because you could also use it to subsume many of the abilities from the current fighter archetypes, especailly the ones that are just 'master of this weapon/style'. It really, really, really annoys me that most of his archetypes are just that, being THE MASTER with his favorite weapon should be intrinsic to the class, fighter archetypes should go into other directions, like military types, inteligent or charismatic fighters, or historical types, not just "Archer" or "Two weapon master"
OT: I see absolutely no reason why the combat book shouldn't have spells, considering that many of the martial classes can also cast spells (paladin, ranger, etc...)
And like the Paizo people said, it's not about combat classes, it's about combat, and ALL classes get into combat.
Also UM did have a lot of stuff for martial classes, like the paladin, ranger and even the monk.
TOB didn't have a very Asian feel to me.
But it did have a very Anime feel.
TOB was a very cool book. Anime and Wuxia influences and feel aside, it was not well balanced. The swordsage using the fire school was a better blaster than the sorc. There was more but I digress on this point.
I don't own UC yet but 2 people at my table do and I've pored over it, it's a solid book. I don't feel it was overly weighted towards "Castys", it gave them options, some of which may not have been well conceived. Prof. Cirno points to one upthread in particular, a spell that eliminates AoO, there is another that allows a container to dispense unlimited ammunition. These may prove to be unbalancing in the long run but they are both spells to help casters in combat, that's the stated point of the book.
The Martial classes are not without options, prior or after this book. That Power Attack is still the most heavily used feat is not a mark against UC. It's a sign that PA is the way players want to play their character. Combat Expertise OTOH is one of the most underutilized feats in the Core book.
Fighter only feats aren't really that. Eldritch Knights and the Magus can get them, but the Barby, Pally and Ranger don't. That's not a great idea in my view. More feats that play off fighter class features is not a bad idea. That's true of any character feature though.
I want more options in these books that don't directly involve the classes.
Rules for leveling mounts outside of the Familiar/Animal Companion rules would be nice, especially for characters that take the Mounted Combat feats. These feats lose alot of utility after a certain level as the mounts drop to almost any single attack.
Playing along the same lines, come off flying mounts. Seriously this should have been addresed long ago. Exotic Mounts are not exclusively the province of the "Beastmasters". Elephants and Dinosaurs just make sense in the Golarian setting.
I also hear the complaints of Ultimate Monk, but most of the styles can be used by anyone and the grappling feats are a nice addition to the fighters. It seems that to many people wanted TOB per combat powers, that's a mechanic that became 4th Ed. I'm not sure that this system will really mesh with the current game without blowing balance out of the water. After we incorporated that book in 3.5 days encounter CR had to go up by +3. That's bad math.
The fire school was cooll but probablty overpowerd.
Plus TOB 'gave' It's classes a crap ton of them because they sorta had thier own 'spell/strike' progression on top of thier normal feats and class abilities.
In the fighter's case that would not be an Issue.
We're talking 11 bounus fighter feats (with 4 oppourtities to retrain) over the course of 20 levels.
We actually use a homebrew rule in one of our games that TOB manuveres, strikes and stances ARE on the table. Rule is your Full BAB classes (and rogues/monks) treat char level as initiator level. You still have to meet any Manuvere preqs. (So no taking Mithral Tornado as your first manuvere) and as usual you can only be in one stance at a time. Except the Stlye Master Monk who uses the style mechanic for his style feats.
There is NO RECOVERY Mechanic. You make use a given strike 1/day when you select it, plus 1more for every 4 Full BAB (or Rogue/Monk levels)char levels you have. SO number of uses for a given manuvere is capped at 6/day.
Fighters, Samurai can access Diamond Mind, Devoted Spirit, Iron Heart, Stone Dragon, Tiger Claw and White Raven using thier Bonus Combat Feats
Paladins can access Devoted Spirit, White Raven by giving up LOH and they can select a move whenever the would have gained a mercy.
Rangers can access Tiger Claw, Diamond Mind, Devoted Spirit using thier combat style feats or selecting one in place of a Favored Enemy or Favored Terrain or the Spelless Ranger from APG can select a TOB move in place of a Ranger Trick.
Rogues can access Shadow Hand or Tiger Claw via Rogue Talents.
Barbarians can get Tiger Claw or Stone Dragon Via Rage powers.
Cavaliers (or any archetype that gets bonus feats) can get White Raven, Devoted Spirit or Diamond Mind via Bonus Feats.
Monk can get ANY martial style via their bonus feats.
No Class that gets a 3/4spell progression has access to TOB stuff. (unless they multiclass and thier caster class levels DO NOT count as initiator levels)
Basically this makes TOB decent for all full Martial classes and pretty crap for Casters. Only fighters can retrain.
This hasn't effected power level much. Just the full melee classes (particularly Fighters and Rogues) get to do awesome stuff.
Unfortunaely we one use this in one offs and stand alone modules. So no campaign for me so far. sniff
I've only seen a fighter, ranger, rogue and pally use this so far (our groups caster lovers still stick with casters, Paul has a Mad LOVE for Witches and Scroll masters and Leanna always seems to be a 'girly full caster' of some kind) and it works well.
Anyone with an interest/opinion on this go to:
Anyone with an interest/opinion on this go to:
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d20, AD&D et al have always been incredibly over the top in the extent and power of magic in the game worlds offered and the rule-sets published.
After posting on how to run a 'low magic' campaign and getting sniped at by a whole bunch of people saying how that would be 'boring' or 'wouldn't work with PF', I find it hilarious that people complain about magic being involved so heavily in a combat supplement.
If you want to play 'gritty' combat-only, no-magic character which works well within the game, play another RP system, d20 in any incarnation CANNOT provide you with this and NEVER has been able to....
Play a Fighter who never uses a magical weapon, armour, cloak, rings, helmet, bootts and belt and you will be re-inventing the 'Corpse' character class.
Your 'non-magic' sword swinger is in any campaign you care to name, dripping with magical items and lights up like a Christmas Tree to Detect Magic at mid-high level.
So get over this self-delusional idea that Ultimate Combat, or indeed ANY combat in PF doesn't involved oodles of magic.
It always has and it always will....
AHH CLONE