stuff
I don't think anything you can bold is going to be some final counterpoint to the idea that SKR could have poorly written that post or without thinking it out completely... In other words, you can't really prove (bar SKR's own confirmation) that he CONSCIOUSLY intended every possible reading you could take from his post, even if that reading is correct for the RAW of what he actually wrote.
So we're left with Paizo addressing the situation, and apparently intending to find a comprehensive solution. I am so much more happier with that situation than with the one where they ignore rules issues. YMMV
RD was asking for evidence as to weather or not this is a clarification or a retcon I am helping him out. If you think SKR was having a bad day thats fine others of us feel that he wrote what he wrote for a reason. Twice in the same FAQ post its seen that with Feral Combat Training you can make every flurry attack with your chosen natural weapon.
We arent even on the same page the Ruling i am talking about in what you quoted is the FAQ on feral combat training.
How about this, if attributing ill intentions to others is a recipe for unhappiness, attribute me pure motives in the following: Give me your bank account numbers, credit card numbers, social security / id numbers, full name, address, mother's maiden name, etc. After all, you don't want to assume I've got ill intent, that'll make you unhappy, right? (Hint: Please, don't actually do this, its an example and an exaggeration to prove a point.)
There is a huge difference between weighing the potential consequences of your actions and acting with prudence, and assuming that everyone that disagrees with your point of view has some reason to be duplicitous.
You can realize that giving out those numbers would be a bad idea without assuming that the person "would" do something bad with them. Because it is one possible interpretation, and because the consequences would be grave, it would be prudent not to take the action.
It doesn't follow that the only reason you asked for them was to do something untoward.
@ ShawocatX
The verb "to lie" means: to speak falsely or utter untruth knowingly, as with intent to deceive. The intent to deceive is explicit in the word.
You can say "The are incorrect", or "they contradict themselves" without attributing an intention, but you can not say "they lie" without attributing an intention.
Secondly, just because I do not attribute your actions with malicious intentions does not mean I must do everything you ask.
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ive also noticed a major change in mentality on these boards lately. seems lik epeople are snapping and being excessivly agressive to everything they disagree with. im guilty of it when people call out my posts, that are intended to help people. but yeah...
Change? Were you around for the playtest and forgot everything that went on then?
You know, sometimes I wonder why they put up with us. Thinking back about the various fiascos, from virtually everything in ultimate combat to the vow of poverty to various incarnations of summoners, I think paizo's staff would probably end up with a lot fewer ulcers if they just closed the boards down.Change? Were you around for the playtest and forgot everything that went on then?ive also noticed a major change in mentality on these boards lately. seems lik epeople are snapping and being excessivly agressive to everything they disagree with. im guilty of it when people call out my posts, that are intended to help people. but yeah...
And a lot less profits.
Master Arminas
You know, sometimes I wonder why they put up with us. Thinking back about the various fiascos, from virtually everything in ultimate combat to the vow of poverty to various incarnations of summoners, I think paizo's staff would probably end up with a lot fewer ulcers if they just closed the boards down.Change? Were you around for the playtest and forgot everything that went on then?ive also noticed a major change in mentality on these boards lately. seems lik epeople are snapping and being excessivly agressive to everything they disagree with. im guilty of it when people call out my posts, that are intended to help people. but yeah...
Any heat they took from vow of poverty they earned. Both from writing it and defending it by insulting the entire concept of the monk without material possessions and saying it SHOULD be subpar (cause a guy who gains power by not wearing metal and a guy who sees better in the dark by getting angry makes SOOOO much more sense!).
Seriously, they brought all of that on themselves.
But Stream, poverty sucks! LOL I wasn't a member then, but I read some of the old threads. Good God ya'll!
Master Arminas
You know, sometimes I wonder why they put up with us. Thinking back about the various fiascos, from virtually everything in ultimate combat to the vow of poverty to various incarnations of summoners, I think paizo's staff would probably end up with a lot fewer ulcers if they just closed the boards down.Change? Were you around for the playtest and forgot everything that went on then?ive also noticed a major change in mentality on these boards lately. seems lik epeople are snapping and being excessivly agressive to everything they disagree with. im guilty of it when people call out my posts, that are intended to help people. but yeah...
The feedback often makes them better, and things like the Vow of Poverty deserve to be spoken against. I am not advocating not being civil while giving criticism however.
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I forgot that quote. I love it. (Side point, I was on SKR's side on that discussion, I'm fine with some options being weak, so long as they remain options and can be ignored.)But Stream, poverty sucks! LOL I wasn't a member then, but I read some of the old threads. Good God ya'll!
Master Arminas
I hated that quote. I found it dismissive of anyone that wanted to actually have a viable option for gearless monks, monks that actually lived up to their flavor.
The sour scene around VoP cannot be laid solely at the feet of those that hated how it turned out. Did some of those that disliked the VoP post uncivilly? Yes.
But many more had legitimate griefs with it and communicated that politely.
What they got in return was snark and derision, both from one developer and those that apparently felt that anyone who was unhappy with the VoP must have been a powergamer, certainly not people that actually wanted monks to feel like monks and actually have a chance at being a full-fledged party member in a standard AP.
Wasn't exactly a nice feeling around that time.
I'm in the sort of weird position of being the person to whom the clarification was originally directed, and I don't think any malice or duplicity was intended, and I don't really think that determining whether a "retcon" occurred is really helpful. If it did, so what? What does that mean? Some people are allowed to be a little madder or something? That doesn't really fix any issues, and it certainly doesn't aid the dialogue between deeply entrenched players and developers that would be helpful in getting this whole fiasco settled. At this point, as long as they get around to unbreaking the big pile of things that the clarification revealed don't work and perhaps explicitly clarify a few other things that are derivable under RAW with the clarification (such as flurrying with two temple swords) but may be played wrong by people who don't catch them, I'm fine. Whether that's by simply allowing flurrying with one weapon (nice fix as it unbreaks every single issue, doesn't break the characters of people who are flurrying with two weapons, and doesn't need to be widely propegated since so many people already play that way), or issuing a slew of errata and patches to make all the broken and silly stuff less broken and silly, I'm fine with that. I don't think it's crazy to look at things that have been published and that have been written at various times and conclude that one way or another something unfortunate must have gone on, but I don't think it's helpful.
If there is one thing that I don't believe, it's that many people who were paying any attention at all really thought that you couldn't flurry with a single weapon. If there was any significant contingient that thought that, where were the rules clarifications questions about Zen Archers and Sohei before now? How come none of them ever spoke up in any of the Advice threads where someone has a monk doing just that? Overlooking every single weapon-using monk in every book that has one, I can see; I don't think I'd ever carefully read any of those before. Overlooking three popular monk fighting styles is harder to buy.
I think everyone knows my opinion on this, and I am not here to express my opinion on the ruling.
I am here to ask everyone to please tone down the developer hate. I really doubt they hate monks, want to nerf them at every turn, want to urinate on your head, be disingenuous, ruin your PFS characters, and laugh at you as you go and use someone else's product for your gaming purposes.
Absolutely ion agreement with this. I do not for one minute believe the devs have it in for monks. I do think that they have their reasons for wanting this ruling a certain way, though I do not agree it's the right decision. At the end of the day, these guys are only human just like the rest of us.
Please, let's keep the debate factual and the suggestions constructive.
The reason I say that is if you read the context in which he made this ruling, he claimed that he couldn't just alter AoMF because that would be a power up and he's never going to do that.
This is the problem here, with the Amulet of Mighty Fists. There was a single root fallacy that the decision was based on:
Amulet of Mighty Fists is a monk item.
It isn't, it's an item for the druid's animal companion. Seriously, I bet that's where most of them are employed. Of course if you made it cheaper you would then be powering up druids, who are already more than powerful enough already.
Following on from that was the idea that if you gave the monk something that did the same job as the AoMF but was cheaper, it would make it redundant, hence the nerf-bat applied to Brass Knuckles. Again, untrue, as the main recipients from the AoMF were creatures that could not use brass knuckles.
The biggest problem with not providing a power-up is that it assumes that all classes are perfectly balanced, which they are not.
I don't think they hold answers back based on how the board acts. If that were the case the FAQ would never have been made. This thread started off bad, but has calmed down. TSK there is at least on big argument a week it seems. It is par for the course.
The name amulet of mighty fists is a pretty big hint as well that wolves aren't the the primary intended users. Plus, why would druids need it? They already have (greater) magic fang.
AMoF was originally printed in a 3.0 splatbook (Sword and Fist), called the Amulet of Mighty Fists, and the clear intention was for it to be used for monks, yes. However, this was back in 3.0, an environment where large numbers of natural attacks were something that very few characters had access to (although lots of druids used it too). Nowadays in PF, there are loads of charcaters with natural attacks, druids, summoners, certain rangers, sorcerers and barbarians. Thatever the "intent" of the original designers multiple editions ago is irrelevant at this point, since the AMoF is now basically a druid/summoner item regardless of the legacy name foisted on it from 3.X
This is what puzzled me the most about the context of the original statement, since I would have expected SKR to be sharp enough to realize this.
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The Amulet was originally created as a monk item back in 3.0. It first appeared in Sword & Fist, the splatbook intended for fighters and monks.
Oh I don't deny that was what it was intended for, but that's not who ended up getting the most out of it. Once you had animals with 3+ attacks, it was worth far more to them than to the monk.
The game designers don't care if the classes are all perfectly balanced. They want some classes to be more powerful than others. They want some PCs to have to sit back and be wall flowers. Their problem is, I assume, they are afraid that giving the monk this power up will upset where they want every class' power in relation to other classes.
Why? You are making a large assumption that the designers want some classes, and therefore some players, to be sidelined. Therefore, they want some players to have less fun.
What is the point of the designers having that attitude? What purpose does it serve?
Players not having fun = players less likely to want to play = less sales.
I cannot see any purpose served by having this attitude, which is why I am not inclined to believe it. I find it much easier to believe that the designers wish to tread carefully with regard to relative power in case they make a mistake that makes a class suddenly shine too much in relation to the others, and that they prefer to be cautious.
I am also inclined to think that the small pool of developers at Paizo may be less well acquainted with the monk than other classes - remember it was altered little in the alpha and beta tests, making me inclined to think it was a low priority for them. They want to be wary of giving a class with relatively few defensive weaknesses a stronger offensive capacity. That is an attitude I can respect, although I think in this case it is unnecessary.
I can't answer "why". Its hard enough for me to respect that philosophy as an equally valid alternative.
And this does not on it's own speak volumes? Like maybe that is NOT their philosophy?
To answer "why?" is a bridge too far for me. But they've given us plenty of evidence that this is part of their design philosophy.
When you want to prove a malicious act, you need to provide means, method and motive. If you cannot provide motive, you have not proved that the case is malicious, end of.
There is an old saying: "Never ascribe to malice what can better be attributed to incompetence." Not that I am accusing the Paizo staff of incompetence, but when you deal with committees of people, stuff goes wrong all the time.
As far as being "less well acquainted with the monk then other classes", its their job to know the monk. Its their job to communicate with their client (us purchasers of the game) about what we want.
Yes, and to know this, we have to be willing to tell them - which is what we are doing here. In my experience, people are more willing to listen to calm, reasonable explanations than accusations of deliberately spoiling things.
As for 'treading carefully', this new ruling significantly nerfs the monk. The game designers' willingness to significantly nerf the weaker classes and significantly power boost the more powerful classes (which occured a few month ago) proves you wrong.
Well they gave the monk a power up from 3.5, and did likewise with all the combat classes. There's also the Antagonise feat, which gives the melee classes a massive advantage over the casters. I'd say that kind of utterly invalidates your argument that you claim to have 'proved'. I would need more evidence than a few recent rulings in the face of that to convince me this is all some nefarious conspiracy for which you cannot provide a reasonable motive.
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I can't answer "why". Its hard enough for me to respect that philosophy as an equally valid alternative.And this does not on it's own speak volumes? Like maybe that is NOT their philosophy?
It's easier to demonize a group that has done something you dislike than sympathize. Why try to understand and be polite when being angry and sarcastic satisfies a sense of self entitlement so much more? It's a sad truth both for the internet and general human nature.
The truth is that Paizo made a decision we dislike. They did it not because of incompetence or malice, but because it was clarifying their view of how Flurry of Blows should be. If it was done out of malice, they wouldn't be deliberating for the last couple of weeks on the repercussions of this change. There is no conspiracy to make classes worse than others or 'keeping melee from having nice things'. That's just the overpassionate anger talking in spite. We've shown them the math and have continued to tell them about our disapproval for the ruling. All we can do is be patient.
Sub-optimal was the exact phrase that Sean used. LOL
Master Arminas
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I'm not assuming maliciousness on their part. I'm assuming different opinions and philosophies from my own - so different as to be difficult for me to understand. I've had the same thing (differences so extreme as to be difficult to understand) happen in other (non-gaming) situations with other people. I don't know what you think this is supposed to say - that diversity exists in the gaming community?
Are you aware that the monk was widely considered one of the weakest classes in Pathfinder (the power ups from 3.5 notwithstanding) before this ruling?
Are you aware that this ruling further nerfed the monk?
This may shock you. But myself and many other optimizers consider the PF monk to be a NERF from the 3E monk. Before this particular retcon, even. And we considered the monk in 3E to be the weakest base class there (if you include splats, Samurai and possibly Soulknife "beat" it in the category of "sucking").
Yeah, they got a bunch of cool new ultimately pointless toys. But they lost so much. Their fast movement is now meaningless because by the time it solidly surpasses barbarian's, everyone is flying in important combats if not all day anyway, and PF saw fit to nerf theirs to be land speed only. They can no longer take Imp. Natural Attack, which was the single itsy bitsy safety net that kept 3E monks' damage from being utterly pitiful. They can no longer attack with natural weapons at the end of a flurry of blows full attack chain (that tactic conincidentally DID make 3E AoMF potentially useful for monks). They can no longer gain Improved Trip (which was renamed "Greater Trip" in PF). Grappling, which they weren't even that great at but could do passably well at least, was tremendously nerfed.
All of the new crap, like "sort of full BAB" ultimately didn't matter, because any optimized "monk" bailed out for a full BAB class or prestige class after 1, 2, or 6 levels anyway. And I know you're going to say, "well, PF made straight classing more appealing by buffing the base classes!" Except that's not quite right. The buffs monk in PF gets are marginally better than what he had in 3E, which again, sucked. They are much, MUCH worse than his 3E options for multiclassing and prestige classing, however, which PF has basically nixed completely as a viable option, particularly the presitge classes. Whether you liked the massive multiclassing and dipping of 3E or not, the fact remains, the net result here is a debuff.
And then this retcon. Just wow.
How much longer should we be patiently waiting for a decent Vow of Poverty?
When the game designers wrote it and responded to customer complaints, they said that they thought some concepts (including that one) should be significantly weaker than others.
If you're interested, Darkwing Duck, I recently had an idea for a very simple and I think well balanced method of handling the vow of poverty / forsake magical items / austere lifestyle type character. Details here.
How so? Most combat maneuvers in 3E didn't even use BAB, other than perhaps on the intial touch attack, which most of the time was a "don't roll a 1" check.
Because honestly i think that the Fob=TWF thing only recently happened I dont think that its something that was actually intended prior to the now super expansive number of good monk weapons.