what this means in my imagination is that A full BAB class, trained in the arts of mortal melee combat, cant seem to instinctively maneuver on the battle field with an opponent that is not actually running away.
Except there are feats that do exactly what you're complaining about. If you choose not to take them, well, then I don't see any problem with assuming your character didn't focus on maintaining a lock on melee combat.
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My high-level D&D characters can fly, shoot energy beams from their hands, regenerate damage, bash through stone walls with their fists, teleport, create impenetrable force fields, run at super speed, move objects with their minds, create duplicates of themselves, warp time, and withstand 100x the amount of damage that would kill the average joe schmoe. If that doesn't make it a superhero game, then please, explain to me what DOES?
Spandex.
Oh, and yes, Pathfinder is about playing characters with super-human powers. As Evil Lincoln, I feel sorry for anyone not noticing such a glaring fact.
I'd like to clarify, though — it's not a "you're stupid" kind of pity. I really think to get the RAW working as specified you need to think of things in comic-book superhero terms...
I am not criticizing the impulse to run grittier campaigns! No sirs and madams.
I struggled with the same thing for years. It's the constant frustration of trying to tell a story with the wrong tools that I pity. E6 can ameliorate this somewhat. There are other games and houserules that let you go further if necessary. But the easiest thing to do is give yourself over to the spandex storytelling, PF is a great system for that.
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*shrug* If you don't see the distinction between characters w/ supernatural abilities and a Superhero RPG, I'm not interested in delving into it.
When the supernatural abilities are the exact same abilities superheroes get, you NEED to explain the distinction if you want to say it isn't a superhero game.
opening a door is a full move action.
really? a person cant open a door in the same amount of time that they can hustle 30 feet?
shouldnt it be, like... 1/3 of a move or something?
Don't think weak interior door. Think big honking medieval door, probably on rusted hinges
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@chobemaster : I could note that I used super-human deliberately and delve into the barren lands of semantics debate, but as that would be immensely silly and since I get your point, let's agree to disagree. :)
Whoops, I missed that. A very good point.
Beowulf was super-human, and certainly not a superhero.
I would disagree that Beowulf is super-human, though I think reasonable people could disagree about ripping off a monster's arm being beyond human capacity. ;) I would certainly agree, either way, though that he is not a Superhero.
Lol; If anything Beowulf is often beyond what most players could actually even do in Pathfinder or D&D; Not only did he rip off the arm of a monster (that was large enough to shred a man in half and eat him) with his bare hands. He also swam straight for a week and fought sea monsters while he was at it. Killed off the race of giants. Swam into a dirty bog and cut off the head of a monster while wielding a giant's sword. He also took on a dragon with just a sword, a shield , and his nephew.
I find it laughable that you think that he could not be defined as a super human.
Lol; If anything Beowulf is often beyond what most players could actually even do in Pathfinder or D&D; Not only did he rip off the arm of a monster (that was large enough to shred a man in half and eat him) with his bare hands. He also swam straight for a week and fought sea monsters while he was at it. Killed off the race of giants. Swam into a dirty bog and cut off the head of a monster while wielding a giant's sword. He also took on a dragon with just a sword, a shield , and his nephew.
I find it laughable that you think that he could not be defined as a super human.
He just has insanely high AC and no one could hit him. :\
*Scratch*
My fighter's Intimidate is based on Charisma?
*more scratching*
I have since come around to acceptance but that was my initial reaction back in Beta.
Theirs a feat to change that and some people are intimadating without str.
What are you rules that raise your eyebrows?-Falling damage and Hps rules in general (no critical non-hp long term conditions - ex. Broken bones, they don't exist)
Called shots can damage people beyond hp
Yeah, we're deep into semantics right now.
Everyone's right, I'm calling this party over.
For what it's worth, I do think of Beowulf as a superhero, just as Gilgamesh and Roland are superheros.
We all agree on various shades of the statement "PF is a superheroic game" so let's leave it at that. I think we all even agree that sometimes we don't want it to be, but it is what it is.
Truce!
To be honest I'm totally not in love with Pathfinder's spell system at all (especially when it comes to sorcerers). That doesn't make me scratch my head though. What does make me scratch my head are some of the newer archetypes, such as the Titan Mauler... which doesn't at all accomplish what you'd like it to.
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Ok, Evil Lincoln, Gilgamesh and Beowulf were mythical heroes, I'll cede that you think they were "superheroes".
Roland was a real person, and a tactical idiot covering the rear of Charlemagne's army as the dude slunk out of Spain with his tail between his legs because the Muslims were tactically superior warriors. Dude died a stupid death. Nothing "heroic" about it, except Europeans, and particularly the French, don't like to think about what really happened down Spain way.
You're right, I think, HD. I was talking mostly about the attached fiction...
And to walk it back even further, I have only ever read excerpts of The Song of Roland, as they were included in a collection I had for a class this year. So I have NO idea what I'm talking about with that one, whereas I'm much better equipped to defend my views on Beo and the 'Mesh.
Advantage: Houston Derek.
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Add Cuchulain, Heracles, Hiawatha, and a host of other mythical characters to the "superhero" category. If they had comic books back in the day, that's exactly what they would have been.
I just feel a need to separate historical, real people from that category, as most of the time their "heroics" are propaganda, the reality is usually all too human.
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*shrug* If you don't see the distinction between characters w/ supernatural abilities and a Superhero RPG, I'm not interested in delving into it.
Sorry, let me just try and wrap my head around this.
You're okay with high-level PCs flying, even under their own (innate and/or permanent) power. You're okay with high-level PCs shooting energy beams from their hands capable of literally vaporizing creatures and objects alike. You're okay with high-level PCs bashing through steel with their bare hands. You're okay with high-level PCs creating force fields that are impenetrable by any and all physical means. You're okay with high-level PCs moving objects with their minds. You're okay with high-level PCs creating duplicates and illusions of themselves or others. You're okay with high-level PCs altering time and space, including teleporting. You're okay with high-level PCs regenerating wounds, even including lost limbs. You're okay with high-level PCs being capable of withstanding more damage than it would take to kill a hundred average men and still standing.
But you scoff at the idea of a high-level PC falling into a vat of acid and surviving? Or being struck by a guillotine blade and living to tell the tale? Or falling from a cliff and walking it off?
Keep in mind that the majority of people who complain that "lava shud be insta=kill d00dz cuz itz moar relistik" don't bother to actually work out the numbers and realize that even at level 20, the majority of PCs without magical protection that fall into a vat of lava or acid are still toast 90% of the time. But what is it about "certain-death situations" that are so unbelievable compared to people raising zombies from the dead or riding on the back of angelic dinosaurs? You can act as elite as you want by not addressing my earlier claim, but go ahead and call me ignorant if it means you'll enlighten me as to what makes one superheroic trait acceptible and another superheroic trait arbitrarily unacceptible.
Then there's your difference. D&D isn't a superhero game.It's not?
My high-level D&D characters can...bash through stone walls with their fists...create impenetrable force fields...warp time...
Just wanted to say "no you can't."
To smash through stone walls or doors you need a pickaxe or hammer. Walls of force, and nearly every other force effect, have hit points and are thus hardly impenetrable. You can speed creatures up and slow them down, but time itself isn't effected by any game mechanic available to player characters.
He just has insanely high AC and no one could hit him. :\Lol; If anything Beowulf is often beyond what most players could actually even do in Pathfinder or D&D; Not only did he rip off the arm of a monster (that was large enough to shred a man in half and eat him) with his bare hands. He also swam straight for a week and fought sea monsters while he was at it. Killed off the race of giants. Swam into a dirty bog and cut off the head of a monster while wielding a giant's sword. He also took on a dragon with just a sword, a shield , and his nephew.
I find it laughable that you think that he could not be defined as a super human.
He just had an insanely high bluff.
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I think the difference between "Superheroes" and "Super high level Fantasy" is one of tone and style rather than of kind. I used to play a lot of superhero games and most of my players at one time or another translated an FRP character into a superhero. But...
In FRP the character gradually develops the superpowers over time rather than getting them all in one go. (I never start games with very high level characters - 4 tops).
In S/H games the adversaries are usually pretty well exactly as strong as the PCs and there is one climactic battle rather than a series of attritional encounters before the Big Bad.
In S/H games, the battles are rarely fought to the death whereas in FRP they almost always are.
You could identify dozens of differences. I think very few of them would be differences of kind. The main difference of kind would, I think, simply be 'setting'. You *could* run a medieval superhero game (e.g. Blackjack from the Curse of the Crimson Throne) but I think it would be hard for players to adapt to the style of a superhero game within a typical fantasy setting. (I have had players who have had trouble adapting to a S/H game *at all*, insisting on killing all the enemy's minions at the end of the fight).
RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32, 2010 Top 8
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@Siegelord
Re: Highpowered heroes as examples.
And Captain America, (all of them) the Black Widow, Batman, Mockingbird Nightwing, Hawkeye, Red Robin, etc. are all doable in E6, (IIRC) does that make them less 'super-heroes'?
Heck Beast Boy and Reptil basically 'just' have Druid Wild Shape. Eric and Kevin Masterson (along with any character who's name ends in 'Lantern') are essentially mortals empowered by an artifact, etc. Are they less 'super-heroes'?
Heck, if you use Superboy (Kon-el, not the reboot one) as a baseline, his only 'power' initially was telekinesis. He used goggles (a magic item) to duplicate some of Kal-el's other powers.
The comic industry says 'yes, they are super heroes'.
He just had an insanely high bluff.
Just to interject pointlessly (since I was somewhat vocal earlier), it's not that I think lava immersion should be instant death, it's that I think that hit points aren't the correct tool to use to deal with environmental damage.
That applies to poison gas, suffocation, drowning, lava immersion, explosive decompression, or anything similar.
I personally believe that unavoidable environmental damage should just be Con damage.
Don't think weak interior door. Think big honking medieval door, probably on rusted hingesopening a door is a full move action.
really? a person cant open a door in the same amount of time that they can hustle 30 feet?
shouldnt it be, like... 1/3 of a move or something?
really? All doors? entering the bedroom of a mansion requires shouldering open a monstrous beast of a door on rusty hinges?
what this means in my imagination is that A full BAB class, trained in the arts of mortal melee combat, cant seem to instinctively maneuver on the battle field with an opponent that is not actually running away.Except there are feats that do exactly what you're complaining about. If you choose not to take them, well, then I don't see any problem with assuming your character didn't focus on maintaining a lock on melee combat.
except that it SHOULDNT be a feat its an obvious, almost instinctive reaction for some one in melee combat. making a melee class take step up as a feat is like making a 7 foot tall gore covered half-orc barbarian take a feat to intimidate with something other than charisma.
... oh wait.
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Spandex and (generally availible) technology level...
Oh, and in D&D/Pathfinder, you gain your abilities by killing orcs instead of by being bitten by a radioactive honey badger.
Now they tell me :(
PCs do all of those superhuman things w/ magic, not their biology. There has never been an assertion that the accumulation of HP represents a physiological change or changes, that a high level fighter can ACTUALLY be stabbed in the kidney and not care because he no longer needs kidney function, or has extra spare kidneys, or his body has developed internal mechanisms to cut off blood flow to the injured area, or whatever.
Being beheaded is fatal a PC, regardless of HP, unless he has OTHERWISE obtained a power specifically defining that he no longer needs his head attached to his body.
I'm not aware of any character flying like Arthur Dent b/c they fell and missed the ground...any sort of PC flight has a source, a justification. Without a specific justification otherwise, PC's can't fly, because you and I can't.
Without a specific justification otherwise, the chemical compounds comprising a PC's tissues react w/ strong acids, and at such a rate that total immersion for an extended period causes death, because that's what happens to you and I. If you HAVE a specific justification otherwise, the most obvious being an item granting acid immunity, then it's not a certain-death situation.
Let me ask it this way. For some reason, your normal-race PC is teleported to the surface of the moon. No one is coming to look for him. He has no items on his person and no spells prepared. Do you start rolling for cold damage and applying the "holding your breath" rules?
What about characters like Doctor Strange (wizard)? Black Knight (mounted fighter with magic sword or cavalier depending on which version)? Angel (flies a lot like a dragon disciple)? Power Fist (monk with elemental fist)? Black Panther (rogue or ranger)? Captain America (shield fighter)?
I'm not trying to argue whether or not Pathfinder characters are superheroes or not. I'm just saying that the term "superhero" is so broad that you really can't discount it completely. I think that some people are using the term in a very broad definition while you are using it more narrowly. Neither one is wrong. I just think that two (or more) definitions are being used.
RAW that make me scratch my head, just from the top of my (scratched) head:
- the assumption of 'total immersion' in Lava if someone wades in... that stuff is considerably heavier than water, guys!
- the whole 'touch AC' affair of firearms - a dragon's scales are thick enough that siege weapons bounce off, but a pistol bullet will easily penetrate them?
- the fact that a staggered character with the Pounce ability can only make a single attack against an oponent adjacent to him - but can still merrily charge an enemy several squares away, delivering a full set of iterative attacks on impact.
- the fact that applying the 'young' template to a Shadow creates a considerably deadlier monster... while lowering the CR at the same time.
Yes, I am aware that I am corner-casing with my third and fourth statement... but there are quite some people on this board whose mantra seems to be 'RAW is LAW'.