|
I have a sticky rules question that I can't for the life of me find the answer to.
If an summoner selects pincers for his bipedal eidolon, instead of the free claws evolution, are the pincers then classified as primary attacks instead of secondary or do they still count as secondary?
I'm sorry if this is a stupid question but I'm a bit too far down in the rules bog to see this clearly.
As I understand it the Pincers are inherently a secondary attack.
The ability to swap them out for claws isn't meant as a potentially advantageous choice as much as a means of allowing a creature that is nearing its maximum number of attacks to select pincers in lieu of something else.
The pincers are treated as primary as long as they are the eidolon's only natural attack.
An eidolon with pincers AND claws would treat the pincers as secondary.
The natural attacks entry in the Universal Monster Rules tells you about primary and secondary attacks, and what to do if a creature's only attacks are from what is by default a secondary natural attack (they act as primary attacks).
So, pincers are secondary (according to the table), but if that's all you have, you attack as if they're primary.
It's worth noting that an Eidolon who has nothing but pincer attacks can treat them all as if they were primary. That could be an interesting build, since pincers are better than claws in almost every way except being secondary, and this will let them act as if primary.
Oddly, that would set up a situation where a spell that grants a bite attack (or any natural weapon) could be used offensively - by granting a bite to the creature, you then apply a -5 to all their other attacks.
What you're describing is several natural attacks of one natural attack form. In which case, they are designated by their standard natural attack type (which is secondary).
Natural Attacks: "If a creature has only one type of attack, but has multiple attacks per round, that attack is treated as a primary attack, regardless of its type."
It looks like SKR just clarified that this applies to multiple attacks of the same type, as well as creatures with a single attack under the effects of Haste or whatever.
Oh wow, I'm stupid. Nevermind.
It was news to me, too. I clicked the link figuring SKR had overlooked something.
NOTHING ESCAPES THE EYE OF REYNOLDS.
... mainly because forcing a monster with 2 pincer attacks (and no other attacks) to have a –5 penalty, but a monster with 1 pincer attack (and no other attacks) to NOT have that penalty is needlessly complex.
|
Was this a recent errata, as in post-Bestiary 3?
I ask this because of the wording of the entry for a Yithian. It has an ability called Deadly Pincers:
Deadly Pincers (Ex) A yithian always applies 1-1/2 times its Strength modifier to damage dealt by its pincer attacks, and deals triple damage on a critical hit. Pincers are primary attacks for yithians.
The description of the ability implies that under normal circumstances, the Yithian's only natural attacks would be considered secondary.
I'm not challenging anything, mind you. I'm just wondering if this was a recent change, or has been hiding under my nose all this time.
The yithian's ability is doing two things.
One, it's saying that the creature gets x1.5 Str on both of its pincer attacks, when normally you'd only get x1 Str for multiple attacks of a particular type.
Two, it's saying that pincers are primary attacks for yithians... which is actually redundant and not necessary to state, because the natural attack rules tell you that because it only has pincers, it treats those pincers as primary. It does leave the door open for weird cases where a yithian gains another natural attack (say, a bite) from a weird source, in which case its pincers would still count as primaries instead of resuming their normal role of secondaries.
But for the most part, #2 is redundant and not necessary to state. Kind of like how a lot of traits say "and X is ALWAYS a class skill for you" (because in PF, once something is a class skill for you, it's ALWAYS a class skill for you, it's not like in 3.5 where it was on a per-class-level basis). It just needs to say "and X is a class skill for you."
... mainly because forcing a monster with 2 pincer attacks (and no other attacks) to have a –5 penalty, but a monster with 1 pincer attack (and no other attacks) to NOT have that penalty is needlessly complex.
Makes sense to me.