See I think it is the worst analogy possible because nothing in antagonize would make the woman throw away her baby.
Well, I don't see it as the scenario itself being important, but the comparison.
Woman is holding her baby. Someone comes running up and knocks her over, causing her to drop the baby.
Woman is holding her baby. Someone yells an insult and she drops the baby to go hit them.
In both scenarios, the baby falls. The outcome is the same in that regard. But in one of those scenarios, the mother was quite clearly the victim of circumstance, while in the other it was her own prerogative to drop the baby, even if it was originally provoked by the person who yelled the insult.
Whether or not antagonize can cause the second situation isn't the matter, but as a relative comparison.
Getting knocked over is like being subject to the usual mind-control type things, primarily magic. It's got nothing to do with the character's personality because their free will just got taken away from them temporarily.
Antagonize runs closer to the second, where it is still the character's own prerogative to do what they do. The person who instigates it just provides a push - the character's actions are, theoretically, still their own, they just sorta went berserk at what was said.
At least, that's what I believe the scenario was meant to illustrate and on those terms, I agree with it. The intimidate option of Antagonize acts pretty much like mundane mind-control, and it doesn't seem fitting to me.
But hey, I'm not the one who even said it, so maybe I should stop reading too much into it :P Still, that was how I considered it.
And, ninja'd by the person who wrote it.
See I think it is the worst analogy possible because nothing in antagonize would make the woman throw away her baby.The woman is holding onto a rope as she brings her baby up the cliff in a basket, her and her fellow travelers are climbing up the cliffs to get away from enemies.
Scenario 1 : A boar charges out of the bushes, hits her, and knocks her down. The baby falls to it's death 500 ft below because she loses her grip on the rope.
Scenario 2 : An enemy below yells out a taunt at the woman. She let's go of the rope to pick up and throw a stone at the taunter. The baby falls to it's death 500 ft below because she chose to release the rope to attack the taunter.
There, although I'm sure you'll whine and moan about this as well, as it's too 'contrived' for you. It's also a perfectly legitimate situation caused by the feat. And the biggest issue is she chose to do it.
Or, in scenario 2 the woman might use her head for more than being nice and just hold onto the rope with one hand while throwing the rock with the second hand.
IF she lets go of the rope it really is her own choice because, in this scenario, it is not nessesary to do so. Or is the woman suddenly onearmed as well? Or too weak to hold a rope with a basket and her baby for even a second?
Now if I start whining it is because even using your silly contrieved examples the feat is not as bad as you make it.
Should you now really go on with the woman being onehanded and having a strength score of like 5 then I'd ask you why on earth she didn't ask one of her able bodied companions to take care of her child.
See I think it is the worst analogy possible because nothing in antagonize would make the woman throw away her baby.The woman is holding onto a rope as she brings her baby up the cliff in a basket, her and her fellow travelers are climbing up the cliffs to get away from enemies.
Scenario 1 : A boar charges out of the bushes, hits her, and knocks her down. The baby falls to it's death 500 ft below because she loses her grip on the rope.
Scenario 2 : An enemy below yells out a taunt at the woman. She let's go of the rope to pick up and throw a stone at the taunter. The baby falls to it's death 500 ft below because she chose to release the rope to attack the taunter.
Scenario 3: Anything that can cause the 'stunned' condition causes her to drop the rope.
Just making sure that some of the other possibilities are brought into light as well.
Further, for scenario 2, nothing says that she wouldn't use a move action to tie off the rope or step on it before trying to find a rock to sling at him. Or that she even needs two hands to hold the rope, meaning she could throw a rock regardless of what she's doing with the rope. And let's be honest, throwing a rock is probably the best she can do as a level 1 commoner (probably), so that is a valid 'attack' for her, even if she completely misses.
Anyway, I think that a fine houserule fix to the feat's use could be that it can only be used against hostile enemies while in combat, and possibly also if the target is hostile towards you and you are out of combat.
RPG Superstar 2011 Top 32
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Save for the fact that you leave out a great deal. For one comparing it to a lvl 0 spell is flat out ignoring the fact that spells go beyond lvl 0. So the feat is on par with spells for.... 1 LVL! OMG!
Not even sure what you're trying to say here through all the histrionics.
While intimidate is not hard to pump that's true its not "easy" one still must expend resources. And could we stop pretending that a save is somehow a hindrance to spells. Getting stupidly high DCs is not much harder then a high skill. Sure the skill numbers look better but that's because of different scaling.
This is an interesting claim. By spending only one feat and skill points, no money, no traits, no favored class abilities, I can make a 12 Cha character with a +25 Intimidate bonus at 10th level. Please do show me how to achieve a spell DC of 33+ using the same resources. (33 chosen based on 22 Wis lvl 10 character with good will save needing a 20)
Having looked over the spell list a bit more, it is actually better to compare the feat to daze monster, except with autosuccess and no HD limitation. It is flat out better than a 2nd level spell. I'd say it's not as good as a 4th level spell, so we have a feat that's about equivalent to a 3rd level spell, usable at will with no save, starting at 1st level. That's just the intimidate effect - add the diplomacy effect and we're in 4th level spell territory. Restrict the feat somehow to 7th level characters and it's power is a lot more reasonable.
I will state again that if you are using Antagonize in your games and having fun, go for it. I'm just explaining why I don't. My group doesn't ban it, we just think it makes the game worse if it exists so we don't use it.
P.S. a misfortuned guy making a save versus a persistent spell needing 4 consecutive natural 20s to save still has a better chance than a guy targeted by Antagonize. 1/160000 > 0.
The way to do this sort of thing is not to compell an attack, it is to give a penalty to other things until the character cools off or they attack the antagonizer. Compelling action with no save, and such an easy way to max out the check, and with no mechanic to take into account what sort of person the victim is is wrong, it's bad design.
In my perfect game, Antagonize would do this.
It would also not be a feat but rather a standard use of Intimidate, on par in strength with using Intimidate to make someone shaken. (probably a longer duration but the ability to end it early by hitting the jerk). There is no way you need specialized training to try to goad someone into taking a swing at you... sorry, making martial characters spend a feat to be able to attempt this is not only an insult to martial characters, it is also an unnecessarily compliment to a million jerks starting fights in parking lots.
There might be a feat more similar to the current (or even the original) Antagonize representing your character having something beyond schoolyard taunts - if not necessarily magic - with which to take control over his opponent. If it was on par with the original Antagonize in its effect it would also have a Will save and the usual jazz for compulsions. Maybe a DC of 10+1/2 ranks plus Cha, I dunno. Anyway, power concerns aside, a Will save is the right mechanic for this sort of thing and a HD defense is the wrong one, period; just like opposing Intimidate vs AC would be wrong even if it would be less overpowered.
Woman is holding her baby. Someone yells an insult and she drops the baby to go hit them.In both scenarios, the baby falls. The outcome is the same in that regard. But in one of those scenarios, the mother was quite clearly the victim of circumstance, while in the other it was her own prerogative to drop the baby, even if it was originally provoked by the person who yelled the insult.
Can someone explain why she needs to drop the baby?
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Bill lets ignore the mom and baby.
It will cause a healer to decide to let a loved one die.
It will cause a pacifist to decide to break his peace and attack someone.
It will cause a priest chanting a ritual to close a hole to hell to decide that attacking the taunter is more important than keeping an invasion of balors from reaching the material.
It takes away the ability of the character to use reasoning and thought in their actions and simply attack in some way instead of doing something that might be much more important to them.
And even if we allow the "throw a rock" loophole it still waste a standard action and still can cause someone to act out of character.
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Bill lets ignore the mom and baby.
It will cause a healer to decide to let a loved one die.
It will cause a pacifist to decide to break his peace and attack someone.
It will cause a priest chanting a ritual to close a hole to hell to decide that attacking the taunter is more important than keeping an invasion of balors from reaching the material.It takes away the ability of the character to use reasoning and thought in their actions and simply attack in some way instead of doing something that might be much more important to them.
And even if we allow the "throw a rock" loophole it still waste a standard action and still can cause someone to act out of character.
And none of those people should ever be able to be provoked into losing control, blowing their gasket, or losing their cool against their own better judgment? It needs actual, magical mind control to achieve that? I don't see it.
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And none of those people should ever be able to be provoked into losing control, blowing their gasket, or losing their cool against their own better judgment? It needs actual, magical mind control to achieve that? I don't see it.Bill lets ignore the mom and baby.
It will cause a healer to decide to let a loved one die.
It will cause a pacifist to decide to break his peace and attack someone.
It will cause a priest chanting a ritual to close a hole to hell to decide that attacking the taunter is more important than keeping an invasion of balors from reaching the material.It takes away the ability of the character to use reasoning and thought in their actions and simply attack in some way instead of doing something that might be much more important to them.
And even if we allow the "throw a rock" loophole it still waste a standard action and still can cause someone to act out of character.
And someone who has no knowledge of you or your buttons or what would make you go over the edge can always, on their first try, in less than six seconds, make you stop trying to pour the potion of healing down the throat of the most important person in the world to you because they said a few words to you?
Do you really think that's ok? Because if you do, then there's no reason at all to ever have any game balance at all.
My big problem with it is I just don't understand how an Intimidate roll, which is supposed to scare people, could make someone want to attack you.
Seems to me like the Diplomacy version is fine, and the Intimidate version should have done the opposite - prevent someone from attacking you for a round instead.
Bill lets ignore the mom and baby.
It will cause a healer to decide to let a loved one die.
It will cause a pacifist to decide to break his peace and attack someone.
It will cause a priest chanting a ritual to close a hole to hell to decide that attacking the taunter is more important than keeping an invasion of balors from reaching the material.It takes away the ability of the character to use reasoning and thought in their actions and simply attack in some way instead of doing something that might be much more important to them.
And even if we allow the "throw a rock" loophole it still waste a standard action and still can cause someone to act out of character.
First, using an action to make the enemy waste an action is just what this feat is meant to do. So that's working as intended.
Second, could you quote the part of antagonize that rules that the target decides in his own free will to attack?
I keep rereading it and somehow I can't find that part.
I have the version I am reading here, just in case:
d20pfsrd version:
Benefit: You can make Diplomacy and Intimidate checks to make creatures respond to you with hostility. No matter which skill you use, antagonizing a creature takes a standard action that does not provoke attacks of opportunity, and has a DC equal to 10 + the target’s Hit Dice + the target’s Wisdom modifier. You cannot make this check against a creature that does not understand you or has an Intelligence score of 3 or lower. Before you make these checks, you may make a Sense Motive check (DC 20) as a swift action to gain an insight bonus on these Diplomacy or Intimidate checks equal to your Charisma bonus until the end of your next turn. The benefits you gain for this check depend on the skill you use. This is a mind-affecting effect.
Diplomacy: You fluster your enemy. For the next minute, the target takes a –2 penalty on all attacks rolls made against creatures other than you and has a 10% spell failure chance on all spells that do not target you or that have you within their area of effect.
Intimidate: The creature flies into a rage. On its next turn, the target must attempt to make a melee attack against you, make a ranged attack against you, target you with a spell, or include you in the area of a spell. The effect ends if the creature is prevented from attacking you or attempting to do so would harm it (for example, if you are on the other side of a chasm or a wall of fire). If it cannot attack you on its turn, you may make the check again as an immediate action to extend the effect for 1 round (but cannot extend it thereafter). The effect ends as soon as the creature attacks you. Once you have targeted a creature with this ability, you cannot target it again for 1 day.
My big problem with it is I just don't understand how an Intimidate roll, which is supposed to scare people, could make someone want to attack you.
Seems to me like the Diplomacy version is fine, and the Intimidate version should have done the opposite - prevent someone from attacking you for a round instead.
I can see a good argument for antagonize (or something similar) causing the target to be startled or briefly frightened into losing their action. But I can see attack as well. In both cases, think of it as whacking the fight or flight response hard enough.
And someone who has no knowledge of you or your buttons or what would make you go over the edge can always, on their first try, in less than six seconds, make you stop trying to pour the potion of healing down the throat of the most important person in the world to you because they said a few words to you?Do you really think that's ok? Because if you do, then there's no reason at all to ever have any game balance at all.
Let's get one thing straight. Taking a standard action to prevent a target from taking the action they want to take is not a game balance issue. If it were, we wouldn't have daze, daze monster, and a whole bunch of other options (including combat maneuvers) in the game.
I would accept some balance debates on the mechanical resolution. By making it a skill check, there's no auto-fail but no auto-success either. The target DC may vary quite a bit even for creatures of the same level. A human 11th level fighter has to make a DC 24 to antagonize a CR 11 Hezrou, a DC 27 to get a CR 11 Black Dragon, and a DC 29 to get a cloud giant. With a fully invested Intimidate and reasonable charisma of 14, he's looking at a +12 on his check vs any of these without investing any feats (11 ranks, +3 class bonus, +2 Charisma, -4 size differential). His chances against the Hezrou are pretty decent, but against the giant they're not so good. Skill focus's +6 pulls the giant into good reach, but the Hezrou becomes a bit too easy - as would be CR 11 gnome clerics (since the size bonus swings 8 points the other way).
But the loss of a desired action on the part of the cleric trying to save his buddy? Not a balance issue.
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But the loss of a desired action on the part of the cleric trying to save his buddy? Not a balance issue.
Yeah, I'm really not seeing the problem either. According to the feat on the Pathfinder PRD:
"On its next turn, the target must attempt to make a melee attack against you, make a ranged attack against you, target you with a spell, or include you in the area of a spell."
It seems to me that this feat forces you to do what you are going to do in 90% of situations. Attack, make a ranged attack or cast a spell that includes the antagonizer as a target.
As for the situation of having a group of commoners around the enemy and only having one spell. How likely is it that you don't even have a cantrip you can use rather than blowing up the commoners? RAW doesn't even specify it has to be a damaging spell you use. You can cast light on the idiot or something.
All this feat seems to do is limit the way you can use one of your standard actions by forcing you to target the antagonizer.
As a grizzled veteran of this argument, I will try to help both sides understand each other:
1) There are some people who have a very strict opinion on what you can and can't do if it is not Magic-with-a-capital-M. They will never be okay with this Feat because it lets you do something other than hit people with sticks.
2) There are some people who consider the free will of a player to be sacrosanct. They will never be okay with something forcing their character to do something, unless that character could then prove in a court of law that they had been manipulated by Magic-with-a-capital-M.
If your argument for or against this Feat falls across one of those lines, you may as well stop, because you're not going to convince the other side.
Before this go further...will someone write out a FULL REAL SCENARIO...I mean write it out as you would be telling someone what happened in your world to your players, either having one of your PC's using it or one of their NPC enemies...you guys are giving some rather rare cases and some really stupid ones at that (lady holding a rope trying to save her baby...who the hell wouldn't try to help her instead??)
FULL SCENARIO...not even any stats needed...just a rundown of maybe 5 rounds of combat, with an average PC group of 3-5, and only ONE person has the feat...I mean how often does more than one person in a group take the SAME FEAT barring teamwork feats? Not often in the games I have played...we actually try to be like, ya know, roleplayers, and do that crazy thing where you play the role of your character. And it doesn't have to be a PC with the feat...use a NPC instead if you would rather...but be as true to yourself as you can...no crazy stuff that would NEVER happen in your game, but something that might really happen if you WEREN'T trying to just TPK...let some others help with it as well so that you aren't the only one deciding what each character is doing
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Before this go further...will someone write out a FULL REAL SCENARIO...I mean write it out as you would be telling someone what happened in your world to your players, either having one of your PC's using it or one of their NPC enemies...you guys are giving some rather rare cases and some really stupid ones at that (lady holding a rope trying to save her baby...who the hell wouldn't try to help her instead??)
FULL SCENARIO...not even any stats needed...just a rundown of maybe 5 rounds of combat, with an average PC group of 3-5, and only ONE person has the feat...I mean how often does more than one person in a group take the SAME FEAT barring teamwork feats? Not often in the games I have played...we actually try to be like, ya know, roleplayers, and do that crazy thing where you play the role of your character. And it doesn't have to be a PC with the feat...use a NPC instead if you would rather...but be as true to yourself as you can...no crazy stuff that would NEVER happen in your game, but something that might really happen if you WEREN'T trying to just TPK...let some others help with it as well so that you aren't the only one deciding what each character is doing
I'll do it in two.
There are two adventurers in a party that are deeply connected by love. It could be familial or romantic. End result is that are deeply devoted to each other down to the core of their being, be they siblings, spouces, or whatever else.
During a battle, one of them is knocked into unconsciousness.
One of the enemies present moves up to perform a coup-de-grace their next turn.
The other party member deeply devoted to the unconscious adventurer is planning to charge in and prevent their loved one from being killed on their turn.
That character gets Antagonized away from their loved one.
It's not that it's a TPK-machine. It's that it is a character concept destroyer.
Having closely-connected characters is not an uncommon thing among our groups. Family relationships or long-term friendships help bring the party together in a lot of ways.
We have had scenarios where the characters our characters cared about more than their own lives have gone down and depended on us being there for them immediately.
The in-setting results of Antagonize would absolutely overwrite and ruin the feel of those characters.
The in-setting results of Antagonize would absolutely overwrite and ruin the feel of those characters.
Two things:
1) For this scenario to occur, you would need to have one character go down in a fight, certain to die the next turn, and another character who is able to save them before that happens. And you need an NPC with the Antagonize feat who will be acting before the rescuer.
This does not seem very likely, unless almost every NPC you fight has Antagonize. If that is the case, then your GM is out to get you. If that is the case, then your GM does not need the Antagonize feat because he controls the entire universe.
2) I assume you have no problem with this scenario if the rescuing character is unable to save their loved one because they have been Dominated, Held, Paralyzed, etc. Correct?
Your argument is : The feat isn't broken because people can choose not to use it in ways that are broken.
That means by definition that it is broken, but can be worked around.
If you're going to houserule it to not be broken, then it's broken. Basically, anything that requires such things shouldn't be in the game.
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The in-setting results of Antagonize would absolutely overwrite and ruin the feel of those characters.Two things:
1) For this scenario to occur, you would need to have one character go down in a fight, certain to die the next turn, and another character who is able to save them before that happens. And you need an NPC with the Antagonize feat who will be acting before the rescuer.
This does not seem very likely, unless almost every NPC you fight has Antagonize. If that is the case, then your GM is out to get you. If that is the case, then your GM does not need the Antagonize feat because he controls the entire universe.
2) I assume you have no problem with this scenario if the rescuing character is unable to save their loved one because they have been Dominated, Held, Paralyzed, etc. Correct?
1. I've seen this scenario turn up before, minus the Antagonize(since we've banned it unanimously). This can also happen with the PC and NPC roles reversed. And considering that I run NPCs like people, it would still be beyond grating and immersion breaking to have NPCs abandon loved ones because they got Antagonized by a PC that's been using it throughout the campaign.
2. No, nor would I have a problem if the character had been hit and tripped with bolas, bull-rushed and cornered, grappled, or otherwise blocked.
None of those ruin that character. She failed to save her loved one because the was prevented from doing so by force, not because she decided that getting mad and attacking someone was more important than the life of someone close to her.
1. I've seen this scenario turn up before, minus the Antagonize(since we've banned it unanimously). This can also happen with the PC and NPC roles reversed. And considering that I run NPCs like people, it would still be beyond grating and immersion breaking to have NPCs abandon loved ones because they got Antagonized by a PC that's been using it throughout the campaign.
Then it's not really relevant, since Antagonize is what we're talking about. Unless you're really saying that the GM happens to have Antagonize on one of the NPCs you're fighting, that one of you happens to go down, that one of you happens to be able to save that person next turn, and that then the GM says "oh! What an amazing opportunity for me to use this highly situational Feat that this character happens to have!"
And if that situation should occur, I'm willing to bet all of my characters' gold pieces that it was engineered to happen that way. In which case the feat is irrelevant, because the GM has decided to ruin your character, and the exclusion of a feat will not stop him.
2. No, nor would I have a problem if the character had been hit and tripped with bolas, bull-rushed and cornered, grappled, or otherwise blocked.
None of those ruin that character. She failed to save her loved one because the was prevented from doing so by force, not because she decided that getting mad and attacking someone was more important than the life of someone close to her. (emphasis mine)
"The creature flies into a rage. On its next turn, the target must attempt to make a melee attack against you, make a ranged attack against you, target you with a spell, or include you in the area of a spell." Must. The only decision the character gets to make is how.
So the problem is that it's not Magic, because nothing can affect someone's behavior except Magic.
EDIT:
Half-ninja'd
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None of those ruin that character. She failed to save her loved one because the was prevented from doing so by force, not because she decided that getting mad and attacking someone was more important than the life of someone close to her.Except even if she were Antagonized (through the feat) she didn't make that decision for herself. It was forced on her through the manipulation of her emotions.
And could all characters be so manipulated, regardless of the circumstance?
Antagonize does not take character personality into account at all, and the explanation for how it works boils down to manipulating people into attacking you by being scary.
So the problem is that it's not Magic, because nothing can affect someone's behavior except Magic.
Oh please, magic has saves, spell resistance, counter spells, and magic items that protect the character.
So the problem is that it's not Magic, because nothing can affect someone's behavior except Magic.
Oh please, magic has saves, spell resistance, counter spells, and magic items that protect the character.
Shhhh,
Don't bring logic into it. It deflates the 'You just do not want fighters to have nice thinks' strawmen, and they're already flat enough as it is.
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1. I've seen this scenario turn up before, minus the Antagonize(since we've banned it unanimously). This can also happen with the PC and NPC roles reversed. And considering that I run NPCs like people, it would still be beyond grating and immersion breaking to have NPCs abandon loved ones because they got Antagonized by a PC that's been using it throughout the campaign.Then it's not really relevant, since Antagonize is what we're talking about. Unless you're really saying that the GM happens to have Antagonize on one of the NPCs you're fighting, that one of you happens to go down, that one of you happens to be able to save that person next turn, and that then the GM says "oh! What an amazing opportunity for me to use this highly situational Feat that this character happens to have!"
And if that situation should occur, I'm willing to bet all of my characters' gold pieces that it was engineered to happen that way. In which case the feat is irrelevant, because the GM has decided to ruin your character, and the exclusion of a feat will not stop him.
It is relevant, because Antagonize turns those scenarios into a farce. And again, I'm talking about the character-breakage that can occur whether it's GMs using it or PCs.
If we want to bait people into making mistakes and focusing on other characters, whether it's the GM or the PC, we roleplay it. We don't use what is damn near an autosuccessful mechanic that forces people to act OOC. If it makes sense for the targetted character, for that situation, then they'll take the bait.
2. No, nor would I have a problem if the character had been hit and tripped with bolas, bull-rushed and cornered, grappled, or otherwise blocked.
None of those ruin that character. She failed to save her loved one because the was prevented from doing so by force, not because she decided that getting mad and attacking someone was more important than the life of someone close to her. (emphasis mine)
"The creature flies into a rage. On its next turn, the target must attempt to make a melee attack against you, make a ranged attack against you, target you with a spell, or include you in the area of a spell." Must. The only decision the character gets to make is how.
So the problem is that it's not Magic, because nothing can affect someone's behavior except Magic.
EDIT:
Half-ninja'd
Or psionics. Or appropriate technology. Or pheromones. But Antagonize as-written is about making people choose to attack you by being scary towards them. It's nonsensical, it paints a world that's hard to invest in, and it makes a joke of many characters.
As written, Antagonize doesn't give the user any explanation for being able to do what he does, but it sure as hell paints everyone he targets as having poor impulse control.
I still say the best fix for Antagonize is to chop off the Intimidate portion and build off the Diplomacy half. It makes sense in-world, and it doesn't remove player agency.
And again, Antagonize completely ignores the target's personality, unlike all that powerful mind-affecting magic.
So the problem is that it's not Magic, because nothing can affect someone's behavior except Magic.
Oh please, magic has saves, spell resistance, counter spells, and magic items that protect the character.
Shhhh,
Don't bring logic into it. It deflates the 'You just do not want fighters to have nice thinks' strawmen, and they're already flat enough as it is.
You're both missing my point. I don't care about this feat. I'm never going to take it, even if I could (I play almost exclusively in PFS).
But I do find it fascinating because it is so polarizing.
Basically, people have one or both of two problems with Antagonize:
1) the mechanics are bad (no saves, can auto-succeed with enough ranks in Intimidate, etc.)
2) it removes player agency
1) is a solvable problem. You just tweak the mechanics.
But for 2), I don't (well, rarely) see anyone with a problem with Dominate, et al, so the problem is not that it removes player agency. It is that it does so through mundane means.
Am I missing anything so far?
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Dominate makes sense, no matter who it targets or when. Antagonize though works regardless of who is targetted and when. It ignores personality in way sthat dominate does not.
And if Antagonize forces a target to act in a certain way, it does a poor job of justifying it. It's not that dominate is magic, it's that it's an outside force that is suppressing one's will.
Taunting and getting under someone's skin is an outside stimulus. It should not be guaranteed to work on everyone at everytime, but it is with the right numbers thrown at it. There are people that will not budge when someone tries to bait them, especially if doing so would cause cause great harm to those they care about.
And if those scenarios fall under "does not work if it would obviously cause harm", it goes back to the mechanics being poor: The feat then has no teeth.
And then there's the in-character problem of looking back and understanding what forced them to act OOC. With magic, they can understand that the evil so-and-so used magic on them to bend their will. That can absolve them of what they have done. But if it's just some guy taunting you, and giving in to it caused great harm, it's hard to take an assurances that it wasn't the target's fault seriously.
That is:
Guy gets ensorcelled. People assure him that what he did was because of being bewitched.
Guy gets crazy off alien spores. People assure him that it was some weird biochemical stuff making him act rabid.
Guy gets antagonized. People ask him "why did you fall for his barbs?"
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It should not be guaranteed to work on everyone at everytime, but it is with the right numbers thrown at it.
Thats 1) mechanics. I think it would be more productive to separate these if you want to avoid countless circular arguments where everyone's cherry-picking points out of each other's posts.
There are people that will not budge when someone tries to bait them, especially if doing so would cause cause great harm to those they care about.
This is part of what I'm getting at. I'm not convinced that a player gets to say "my character is unflappable. She is always in control of her emotions." Because there's a stat for that: Willpower, which is derived from Wisdom. So if you want a character that could never be enraged, you need to make sure they have an inhumanly high Wisdom score.
And Wisdom is what Antagonize is supposed to work against. If the problem is that a character can auto-succeed with a high Intimidate, then the problem is mechanical and can be tweaked.
And then there's the in-character problem of looking back and understanding what forced them to act OOC. With magic, they can understand that the evil so-and-so used magic on them to bend their will. That can absolve them of what they have done. But if it's just some guy taunting you, and giving in to it caused great harm, it's hard to take an assurances that it wasn't the target's fault seriously.
So back to 2) Only Okay With Magic. As I said earlier:
Guy gets ensorcelled. People assure him that what he did was because of being bewitched.
As long as they have Spellcraft. Otherwise he's guilty!
Guy gets crazy off alien spores. People assure him that it was some weird biochemical stuff making him act rabid.
As long as they have Knowledge: Nature. Or Knowledge: Alien Spores. Or whatever. Otherwise he's guilty!
Guy gets antagonized. People ask him "why did you fall for his barbs?"
"Well, we know it wasn't magic, and it wasn't alien spores, the only two things that can affect human behavior. This court finds you guilty of negligence in the death of your loved one. Case closed!"
Unless their defense was canny enough to introduce some kind of legal precedent.
This is my two cents, and the justifications therefore.
Benefit: You can make Diplomacy and Intimidate checks to make creatures respond to you with hostility. No matter which skill you use, antagonizing a creature takes a standard action that does not provoke attacks of opportunity, and has a DC equal to 10 + the target’s Hit Dice + the target’s Wisdom modifier. You cannot make this check against a creature that does not understand you or has an Intelligence score of 3 or lower. Before you make these checks, you may make a Sense Motive check (DC 20) as a swift action to gain an insight bonus on these Diplomacy or Intimidate checks equal to your Charisma bonus until the end of your next turn. The benefits you gain for this check depend on the skill you use. This is a mind-affecting effect.
Now that they added the '10+', I don't have a problem with this anymore.
Diplomacy: You fluster your enemy. For the next minute, the target takes a –2 penalty on all attacks rolls made against creatures other than you and has a 10% spell failure chance on all spells that do not target you or that have you within their area of effect.
I have no problem with this.
Intimidate: The creature flies into a rage. On its next turn, the target must attempt to make a melee attack against you, make a ranged attack against you, target you with a spell, or include you in the area of a spell. The effect ends if the creature is prevented from attacking you or attempting to do so would harm it (for example, if you are on the other side of a chasm or a wall of fire). If it cannot attack you on its turn, you may make the check again as an immediate action to extend the effect for 1 round (but cannot extend it thereafter). The effect ends as soon as the creature attacks you. Once you have targeted a creature with this ability, you cannot target it again for 1 day.
I read the first sentence as flavor text.
Why?First, the second sentence says the target can cast spells at you. Also, I consider extraneous AoOs to be an obvious danger, so I end the effect if there is a gauntlet to be run in order to get to the target. RAI and kinda RAW you now have that it does not cause the barbarian class rage.
Second, the rage spell, the and the moonstruck spell, and bloodmist spell, all specifically note that the use of the word rage refers to back to barbarian. Not so with antagonize.
Third, the same applies abilities, such as the Avatar Gambit (Ex) "rages like a barbarian" use in the Half orc section of the ARG. Again, not so with antagonize.
Fourth, other feats, such as Blood Vengeance in the ARG specifically call out the barbarian like rage. Once more, not so with antagonize.
Since it is not like the other abilities that actually specifically cause a rage effect like the barbarian, then it does not cause the rage effect, it is merely flavor text.
Didn't do my request justice at all there man...I'm not really FOR or AGAINST this feat yet...I'm still looking for a REAL scenario...one that is actually run by more than just one person "writing a story"...do it at your next game, I CAN WAIT and everyone else can too I'm sure
And in that scenario it is the NPC that has the feat right? Give it to a PC instead...show me where it is broken in a REAL breakdown of some sort of actual run game
There's TON of things in this game that can be broken, but most of them are so situational that it doesn't matter most of the time
I will remind people that the feat itself is a "mind-affecting effect", there are ways to guard against those as well as most of any non-human enemies will be completely immune
I'm not asking this to "antagonize" (yea I went there) anyone...I'm looking for some good reasons beyond SUPER F'ING RARE occurrences that this feat is broken...mostly because I'm wanting to use it for a future character...I'm talking to my GM about it and he wants both sides of the argument and I have yet to get clarity beyond the simple scenarios you guys are giving...this is much to help other people but as well it's ME asking for your help as well
Didn't do my request justice at all there man...I'm not really FOR or AGAINST this feat yet...I'm still looking for a REAL scenario...one that is actually run by more than just one person "writing a story"...do it at your next game, I CAN WAIT and everyone else can too I'm sure
I asked this back in one of the previous Antagonize threads. You're not going to get real-world experiences with it, because the people who hate this feat have preemptively banned it. You're going to get lots of carefully constructed scenarios that depend on PCs or NPCs pouring resources into a Feat with the express purpose of ruining characters and/or storylines.
Didn't do my request justice at all there man...I'm not really FOR or AGAINST this feat yet...I'm still looking for a REAL scenario...one that is actually run by more than just one person "writing a story"...do it at your next game, I CAN WAIT and everyone else can too I'm sure
And in that scenario it is the NPC that has the feat right? Give it to a PC instead...show me where it is broken in a REAL breakdown of some sort of actual run game
There's TON of things in this game that can be broken, but most of them are so situational that it doesn't matter most of the time
I will remind people that the feat itself is a "mind-affecting effect", there are ways to guard against those as well as most of any non-human enemies will be completely immune
I'm not asking this to "antagonize" (yea I went there) anyone...I'm looking for some good reasons beyond SUPER F'ING RARE occurrences that this feat is broken...mostly because I'm wanting to use it for a future character...I'm talking to my GM about it and he wants both sides of the argument and I have yet to get clarity beyond the simple scenarios you guys are giving...this is much to help other people but as well it's ME asking for your help as well
I'm tempted to make an encounter where a handful of otherwise pushover monsters on an elevation just barely within the reach of the players make the melee characters charge back and forth over a field of hidden traps while throwing distractions at the casters. Has to be managed carefully to actually force them to make the charge attacks instead of switching to range. Maybe have it happen in the middle of a windstorm. The gambit's only probably good for a round or two before the players catch on and stop it.
The only question is whether the trap cancels the action if the PC doesn't realize it's there.
Didn't do my request justice at all there man...I'm not really FOR or AGAINST this feat yet...I'm still looking for a REAL scenario...one that is actually run by more than just one person "writing a story"...do it at your next game, I CAN WAIT and everyone else can too I'm sure
And in that scenario it is the NPC that has the feat right? Give it to a PC instead...show me where it is broken in a REAL breakdown of some sort of actual run game
Since my objections to the feat stem more from flavor and how I think it breaks characterization, how bout this:
Seeing as Mikaze said that scenario actually happened already without the antagonize part, let's put it on one of the PC's.
You've got a duo of villains. Lovers, partners, whatever, they care about each other and won't abandon one another. One gets knocked out. A party member goes up to coup de grace on their next turn.
Now, if you're running this from any kind of in-character perspective, the other villain will immediately go to stop the player who is about to coup de grace. They would not possibly do anything else.
But then the player with Antagonize goes 'rawr!' and the villain completely ignores the PC about to kill their loved one/partner/friend/etc. to go smack the person who yelled.
Broken in mechanics? Maybe, though that's not really my biggest problem with it.
Broken in flavor and from an in-universe perspective? I sure think so.
Ok...you guys are missing the point of running this as a real scenario...how many PCs are their? I said "no stats" not "no information beyond saying 'a party member", I could get scenarios like this all day...HOW THE HELL did the one villain get knocked out? What was the other characters initiative...its more situational than you are making it out to be, its not some godly I CAN USE THIS WHENEVER I FEEL LIKE IT power...its a standard action itself...if the guy with the feat lost initiative to everyone an goes last...he might even get easily knocked out himself by his turn seeing how easily people get knocked out in these scenarios
At this point I'm giving up on the whole REAL SCENARIO thing...people that are FOR the feat are going to give me crappy ones and people AGAINST the feat are going to make up some super insane way that PC "A" was totally taken against his own desires to attack NPC "C" while holding the button that blows the comet hurling toward earth in twain so that it misses earth and saves humanity...and for some reason the one NPC left to attack JUST SO HAPPENED to be the one with this feat and JUST SO HAPPENED to know to antagonize the PC at THIS PERFECT TIME even though AN ENTIRE BATTLE TO SAVE EARTH had already been mostly played out?...yea I'm just gonna tell my GM nevermind
I'll play an alchemist instead with all his feats in Bluff so that I can sell a Potion of Cure Light Wounds as if it were a POTION OF YOU RULE THE WORLD INSTANTLY to at least one person in every town, cuz hey with a bluff that high who says I CAN'T right lol
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The in-setting results of Antagonize would absolutely overwrite and ruin the feel of those characters.Two things:
1) For this scenario to occur, you would need to have one character go down in a fight, certain to die the next turn, and another character who is able to save them before that happens. And you need an NPC with the Antagonize feat who will be acting before the rescuer.
This does not seem very likely, unless almost every NPC you fight has Antagonize. If that is the case, then your GM is out to get you. If that is the case, then your GM does not need the Antagonize feat because he controls the entire universe.
2) I assume you have no problem with this scenario if the rescuing character is unable to save their loved one because they have been Dominated, Held, Paralyzed, etc. Correct?
You know this spell?
Breath of Life
School conjuration (healing); Level cleric 5
Casting Time 1 standard action
Components V, S
Range touch
Target creature touched
Duration instantaneous
Saving Throw Will negates (harmless) or Will half, see text; Spell Resistance yes (harmless) or yes, see text
This spell cures 5d8 points of damage + 1 point per caster level (maximum +25).
Unlike other spells that heal damage, breath of life can bring recently slain creatures back to life. If cast upon a creature that has died within 1 round, apply the healing from this spell to the creature. If the healed creature's hit point total is at a negative amount less than its Constitution score, it comes back to life and stabilizes at its new hit point total. If the creature's hit point total is at a negative amount equal to or greater than its Constitution score, the creature remains dead. Creatures brought back to life through breath of life gain a temporary negative level that lasts for 1 day.
Creatures slain by death effects cannot be saved by breath of life.
Like cure spells, breath of life deals damage to undead creatures rather than curing them, and cannot bring them back to life.
Antagonize at the right moment and it is useless.
So it is not a far fletched scenario at all- * -
"This does not seem very likely, unless almost every NPC you fight has Antagonize."
We fall back to "if the GM do that he is a jerk"? Antagonize is a very potent weapon in the right hands. In a logical world plenty of adversaries would have it.
After all it is a aggro mechanic. In every game with aggro mechanics where there are multiple players one of them is dedicate to that.
- * -
"I assume you have no problem with this scenario if the rescuing character is unable to save their loved one because they have been Dominated, Held, Paralyzed, etc. Correct? "
Yes, especially as I can take steps to prevent those effects while I can't do nothing beside rising in level to protect from Antagonize.
Dominated is the easiest to avoid, there is that little spell "Protection from [alignment]" that completely trump it.
With 5.500 gp I can get the "protection from mental control by evil creatures" part of the spell as a permanent item that don't use slots.
You know this spell?
So now NPCs are spending Feats on Antagonize and dumping skill points into Intimidate to ensure that once they have killed someone (with the Antagonize/CdG combo, natch), the Cleric (because there will always be a Cleric with Breath of life prepared) can't use Breath of Life (because there will also always be only one Cleric with Breath of Life prepared)?
Coming up with scenarios where Antagonize can be abused is in no way constructive in a conversation towards fixing or justifying the removal of the Feat.
What is constructive? Talking about what's wrong with it. Not what you can do with it. What is fundamentally wrong with it.
So far, I've heard these:
1) It's mechanically imbalanced
This isn't even worth talking about until the other points are resolved
2) Nothing should be able to remove or suppress player agency except Magic (or something Magic-equivalent)
I'm asking if anyone has anything else to add to the list.
@ Drakkiel: And I specifically said in that post that I'm not terribly concerned about the stats and mechanics of it, so much as I am about the flavor and what it means to characters in-game, such as causing someone to act wildly contrary to their personality/values.
But if you only want to argue mechanics and not listen to anything else about it, then fine. I guess I don't really have much else to say about it in that case.
Though I do question how you think a PC antagonizing an enemy so another party member can coup de grace without issue seems contrived, but eh.
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It should not be guaranteed to work on everyone at everytime, but it is with the right numbers thrown at it.Thats 1) mechanics. I think it would be more productive to separate these if you want to avoid countless circular arguments where everyone's cherry-picking points out of each other's posts.
So, mechanics are bad, but we shouldn't speak of mechanics when speaking of this feat?
The problem of the feat is exactly that mechanics are bad.
Make it a mind affecting EX ability with a ST instead of a skill check and most of the problems are gone.
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It should not be guaranteed to work on everyone at everytime, but it is with the right numbers thrown at it.Thats 1) mechanics. I think it would be more productive to separate these if you want to avoid countless circular arguments where everyone's cherry-picking points out of each other's posts.
So, mechanics are bad, but we shouldn't speak of mechanics when speaking of this feat?
The problem of the feat is exactly that mechanics are bad.
Make it a mind affecting EX ability with a ST instead of a skill check and most of the problems are gone.
It's already a mind affecting effect. You say it would be okay if it had a saving throw, but there a lot of people who think the very idea of a character's behavior being altered by anything other than magic is a dealbreaker.
Arguing over mechanics with those people will never go anywhere because mechanics will not address their concerns. You could give it a ST with a DC of 1 and they would not be satisfied because there is still a 1/20 chance that a GM would use the Feat in the Very Common Scenario of the Dying Loved One Who is About to be Coup de Grace'd by an Enemy But Who Can be Saved As Long As No One Interrupts Their Next Turn And if They Fail to Save the Loved One They Will Be Tried in a Court of Law for Negligence and Also Feel Bad About Themselves.
Because there's SO MANY other ways to keep that PC from even trying to save his friend, why is it such a big deal that he can do it with a feat?
The NPC could be a monk..stuns him
The NPC could be an all out grappler build...grapples character and since his bonuses are crazy there's a slim chance he can break grapple
NPC is caster that swift summons monsters to surround him, all of them have attacks with grab
Unseen NPC Assassin that was studying PC comes out and Death Attacks PC, fails save, now is dead
NPC is caster, cast Disintegrate, PC fails save, takes enough damage to put him below 0 and he is "dying" as the condition
I can keep going...the feat itself is not broken...nothing is broken unless it is used in a way that you TRY to make it broken
The REASON I don't have a problem with it....is because ITS MY CHOICE to play this game...it comes down to an ULTIMATE choice...the GM has to CHOOSE to allow the feat, the person with the feat has to CHOOSE the perfect timing to use the feat, YOU HAVE TO CHOOSE to play PF and go by the rules they write in their books including listed feats and abilities...the feat works that way BECAUSE they wanted it to work that way...it didn't magically appear...no PF god came down and generated the page with that feat on it...it was someone's choice as it is yours to even play by the rules
In the end if YOU believe it is broken don't use it...its an opinion not a fact...its my opinion that Sawtooth sabres are broken...you take one feat for them and you basically get a class ability from the Two-Weapon Warrior archetype that they don't get UNTIL LVL 11...but I will still let people know about them so they can CHOOSE to use them if they want
@Diego Rossi: it already is a mind-affecting effect, and acts alot like an (ex) ability, but to make everyone happy yes...make it a ST and there ya go
There are tons of other abilities that could keep the cleric from using breath of life. I really really do not understand (I try it and fail) why all those abilities are ok but antagonize is not.
Example 1: the antagonizer could ready his action to move up to the cleric and hit him once he starts casting. To do that he would not need the feat, he would not need those ranks in intimidate etc.
Example 2: the antagonizer could just move up and hit the dead guy one more. An attack that nearly auto-succeeds and might well bring the target too far below 0 to be brought up.
Example 3: the antagonizer could hit the cleric with a stun or daze or with a silence spell.
Example 4: He could cast a wall of iron spell between cleric and dead loved one.
Example 5: He could dominate the cleric.
Everything of this might be successful in keeping the cleric from using breath of life on his lover. (or party member). Why is only antagonize broken?
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There are tons of other abilities that could keep the cleric from using breath of life. I really really do not understand (I try it and fail) why all those abilities are ok but antagonize is not.
Example 1: the antagonizer could ready his action to move up to the cleric and hit him once he starts casting. To do that he would not need the feat, he would not need those ranks in intimidate etc.
Example 2: the antagonizer could just move up and hit the dead guy one more. An attack that nearly auto-succeeds and might well bring the target too far below 0 to be brought up.
Example 3: the antagonizer could hit the cleric with a stun or daze or with a silence spell.
Example 4: He could cast a wall of iron spell between cleric and dead loved one.
Example 5: He could dominate the cleric.Everything of this might be successful in keeping the cleric from using breath of life on his lover. (or party member). Why is only antagonize broken?
Because antagonize is the one that makes him change his personality of his own free will.
Taking a break from this one, Antagonize makes me that mad.
Because antagonize is the one that makes him change his personality of his own free will.
I asked before in this thread and nobody could quote the part of the rules text that states that it is his own free will.