Cartmanbeck's Guide to Pathfinder Races


Advice

51 to 100 of 448 << first < prev | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | next > last >>

Does AM BARBARIAN know you panned the human favored class bonus for for barbarians? It's a significant part of what made that build so difficult to come up with counters to.

Silver Crusade RPG Superstar 2014 Top 16

Helaman wrote:

Any chance you can open this to printing/extract to PDF from Google docs? Its easier for me to extract and read even if its in development.

Teifling

- spelling error
Tieflings have a demon or other evil outsider in their family history, and this can cause them some social problems dealing with others, as there is the assumption of evil or deceitful.

I like the guide so far - awesome stuff. Looking forward to Dhampir - its one of the more common of the off center races so hoping its close to top on list of priorities.

[edit]Scratch that - Dhampir appears to be in the main body but not in the contents at the beginning of the doc

Yep I JUST finished Dhampir, that's why it wasn't in the table of contents yet. Hope you like it!

Silver Crusade RPG Superstar 2014 Top 16

Atarlost wrote:
Does AM BARBARIAN know you panned the human favored class bonus for for barbarians? It's a significant part of what made that build so difficult to come up with counters to.

While I recognize that the Superstitious rage power can be helpful in that regard, I think you really have to plan your character out specifically to take advantage of it, and most people just aren't going to do that. I will make a mention of it in there though. :-D

Silver Crusade RPG Superstar 2014 Top 16

I have also just added the Android race to the guide (I'm mostly going in order by the Advanced Race Guide but I really like these guys and it was relatively easy because they have very few options.) Enjoy!


One thing I LOVE about small sizes that is worth mentioning:

At the bottom of the Weapons list, you will notice that:

"1 Weight figures are for Medium weapons. A Small weapon weighs half as much, and a Large weapon weighs twice as much."

Also, the same notation is found regarding Armor.

For a large portion of Equipment (Clothes, Tents, Rations, Containers (including waterskins, backpacks, waterproof bags etc.) you will notice that

"1 These items weigh one-quarter this amount when made for Small characters. Containers for Small characters also carry one-quarter the normal amount."

Unfortunately, "A smaller creature can carry less weight depending on its size category, as follows: Small ×3/4" is also a rule of thumb.

BUT! Losing 25% of carrying capacity, coupled with 50% weight items to 25% weight armors is a BIG GAIN. even when stacked with the -2 Str small sized characters generally get.

Example:

10 Str Medium Creature with base 10 Str buys a generic longsword, short bow, studded leather armor, explorer's, backpack, tent, bedroll, blanket, eight days rations, and a water skin for his first outing in the world. Just enough to get him safely to the front doors of the Pathfinder's Society Lodge, for example.

Joe average 10 str human is at 74/100 lbs carried, heavy encumbrance.

8 Str Small Creature does the same. His carry capacity is only 60, due to the reduced size. A human of his size could carry 80! Doh! If he had all medium items, he would be over encumbered by 12 lbs! That sucks! BUT: due to reduced weight of Small Sized items, instead of being at 74% of maximum load, the small sized creature is at 25 of 60 lbs, Medium load, and less than 50% of carrying capacity.

Just saying! HUGE ADVANTAGE... mitigated a little bit if the small sized character is relegated to pack mule status . . . but seriously.

If you choose wisely, you can keep a small character at light encumbrance a lot easier than a medium, and carry more of the stuff you want while you are at it.


As a double check, I decided to try some make believe the math
.
.
.
.

MS= Medium Str Score
MCC = Medium Creature Carry Capacity for Light Encumbrence
SS = Small Strength (Columns line up so that the SS is MS-2 for a more accurate point buy comparison)
SCC = Small Creature Carry Capacity for Light Encumbrance
WCC = Wighted Carry Capacity. WCC = twice the SCC to account for the light weight of small items.

As you can see, the small size can generally actually carry more than a medium at the same point buy value for str, and quite a bit more at actual Str.

Ex. a 10 str Medium can carry less Medium size gear than an 8 Str Small can (33 lbs v 39 lbs)

Likewise, at same stat level, a Small can carry a lot more small appropriately sized items than his same str medium.

Ex. a 10 str medium creature can carry 33 lbs of medium items, a small can carry 24.750 lbs, or the rough equivalent of 49.5 lbs!

Again, the reason for the doubling of the SCC to get the WCC is because small sized items weigh 1/2 or 1/4 what the same item weighs for a medium sized creature. . . See example in previous post.

MS — MCC — SS — SCC — WCC

07 — 023 — 05 — 12.000 — 24
08 — 026 — 06 — 15.000 — 30
09 — 030 — 07 — 17.250 — 34.5
10 — 033 — 08 — 19.500 — 39
11 — 038 — 09 — 22.500 — 45
12 — 043 — 10 — 24.750 — 49.5
13 — 050 — 11 — 28.500 — 57
14 — 058 — 12 — 32.250 — 64.5
15 — 066 — 13 — 37.500 — 75
16 — 076 — 14 — 43.500 — 87
17 — 086 — 15 — 49.500 — 99
18 — 100 — 16 — 57.000 — 114
19 — 116 — 17 — 64.500 — 129
20 — 133 — 18 — 75.000 — 150
21 — 153 — 19 — 87.000 — 174
22 — 173 — 20 — 99.750 — 199.5
23 — 200 — 21 — 114.75 — 229.5
24 — 233 — 22 — 129.75 — 259.5
25 — 266 — 23 — 150.00 — 300
26 — 306 — 24 — 174.75 — 349.5
27 — 346 — 25 — 199.50 — 399
28 — 400 — 26 — 229.50 — 459
29 — 466 — 27 — 259.50 — 519

Silver Crusade RPG Superstar 2014 Top 16

Arizhel wrote:

As a double check, I decided to try some make believe the math

.
.
.
.

MS= Medium Str Score
MCC = Medium Creature Carry Capacity for Light Encumbrence
SS = Small Strength (Columns line up so that the SS is MS-2 for a more accurate point buy comparison)
SCC = Small Creature Carry Capacity for Light Encumbrance
WCC = Wighted Carry Capacity. WCC = twice the SCC to account for the light weight of small items.

As you can see, the small size can generally actually carry more than a medium at the same point buy value for str, and quite a bit more at actual Str.

Ex. a 10 str Medium can carry less Medium size gear than an 8 Str Small can (33 lbs v 39 lbs)

Likewise, at same stat level, a Small can carry a lot more small appropriately sized items than his same str medium.

Ex. a 10 str medium creature can carry 33 lbs of medium items, a small can carry 24.750 lbs, or the rough equivalent of 49.5 lbs!

Again, the reason for the doubling of the SCC to get the WCC is because small sized items weigh 1/2 or 1/4 what the same item weighs for a medium sized creature. . . See example in previous post.

MS — MCC — SS — SCC — WCC

07 — 023 — 05 — 12.000 — 24
08 — 026 — 06 — 15.000 — 30
09 — 030 — 07 — 17.250 — 34.5
10 — 033 — 08 — 19.500 — 39
11 — 038 — 09 — 22.500 — 45
12 — 043 — 10 — 24.750 — 49.5
13 — 050 — 11 — 28.500 — 57
14 — 058 — 12 — 32.250 — 64.5
15 — 066 — 13 — 37.500 — 75
16 — 076 — 14 — 43.500 — 87
17 — 086 — 15 — 49.500 — 99
18 — 100 — 16 — 57.000 — 114
19 — 116 — 17 — 64.500 — 129
20 — 133 — 18 — 75.000 — 150
21 — 153 — 19 — 87.000 — 174
22 — 173 — 20 — 99.750 — 199.5
23 — 200 — 21 — 114.75 — 229.5
24 — 233 — 22 — 129.75 — 259.5
25 — 266 — 23 — 150.00 — 300
26 — 306 — 24 — 174.75 — 349.5
27 — 346 — 25 — 199.50 — 399
28 — 400 — 26 — 229.50 — 459
29 — 466 — 27 — 259.50 — 519

For this math, are you assuming that ALL gear that the Small-sized creature carries is sized for a small creature? Because a lot of gear isn't dependent on your size so it would weight the same. Such as the bedroll, backpack, waterskin, anything like that... the weight of those wouldn't go down just because you're small size. The stuff that DOES change size is clothing, armor, weapons, magic items that are worn on feet, hands, chest, etc. but not magic items that would be worn on the neck or the head, etc.

My group has never really used the encumbrance rules unless someone tried to carry unreasonable amounts of items (like the 300 arrows that have been mentioned on another thread).


Anything with a superscript 1 next to it on the equipment list in the CRB weighs 1/4 (not 1/2) the listed weight. This includes: Backpack Bedroll, Blanket, Belt pouch, rations, sack, tent, waterskin, climbers kit, disguise kit, musical instruments, all outfits.

I assume 1/2 because although many things I usually carry (Hammers, Pitons, and Rope) weigh the same, there are FAR more items on the 1/4 weight list than on the full weight list, by weight.

Ex My tent weighs 5 lbs, yours weighs 20.
My Explorers Outfit weighs 2 lbs, yours weighs 8
My Cold-Weather outfit weighs 1.75 lbs, yours weighs 7
My 8 days rations weigh 2 lbs. Yours weigh 8
My Waterskin weighs 1 lbs. Yours weighs 4.
My Backpack weighs 0.5 lbs, yours weighs 2
My Bedroll weighs 1.25 lbs, yours weighs 5
My Blanket weighs 0.75 lbs, yours weighs 3
We both carry a hammer 2 lbs
We both carry Silk Rope 5 lbs
We both carry 5 pitons 2.5 lbs
We both carry a lamp 3 lbs (well, not really. We smalls inveriably have low light vision, so we are good with a candle, but for the sake of arguement).
We both carry a crowbar. 5 lbs
we both have a vial of acid 1 lbs.
we both carry alchemist's fire 1 lbs.
We both have full arms and armor, including shield.
We both have the full host of weightless items.
We both have a spell component pouch in case the wizard runs out 2 lbs
We both carry 5 pints of oil for the lamps
I am running out of items I would be packing . . .

Lets take a look!
Small 38.75 -- Medium 83.5

Now, what gear do you think was under packed or over packed to account for the over 2:1 ratio?

Light Encumbrance STR needed for the Gnome: 16, light encumbrance for a medium, 18 str.

Yep, right on track.

This is not a contrived list it is every single thing I could think of that a level 1 could possibly pack if he started with a just heading out shopping. The arms and armor will pull the average closer to 50% as you buy more than 80 lbs in armor and arms. It will not force a greater difference than 2:1.

The fact that a great many of the items I (and in my opinion everyone should) carry are weightless; including bells, ink, paper, chalk, charcoal sticks, tinder twigs, flint and steel, candles, sewing needles, fishhooks, and inkpens, is a wash, since it makes no change at all.

Once you pass Level 3-5, you should have a haversack, at which point weight is largely moot anyhow.

But, Yes, you can easilly outfit a character given the items listed above with everything you are likely to need or want and maintain well under a 50% weight when compared to a medium sized creature.

Pull your inventory lists, look at the weapons, armor (1/2 weight) and the items above. Add the weight up as if you were small sized. I would be shocked and astounded if you did not end up under 50% weight compared to your Medium sized counterpart to account for the exact same goods.

So in short, Yes, I do feel that the table is accurate so long as (as I mentioned) you are not acting as the party pack mule.

Liberty's Edge

You put the Silver Tongued alternate racial trait for Human in red because you feel that it is better to put the skill point in Diplomacy.

I believe that the point of Silver Tongued is that you already max out Diplomacy and Bluff and then get 2 more points over that. Meaning that your Diplomacy and Bluff are the same as those of a "skilled" character 2 levels above you. And, in exchange, you are maxing out one less skill.

For any social character, this is very good. And that is without even taking into account the +1 max shift in attitude.

I honestly believe that Silver Tongued is worth at least green for such a character.

Silver Crusade RPG Superstar 2014 Top 16

The black raven wrote:

You put the Silver Tongued alternate racial trait for Human in red because you feel that it is better to put the skill point in Diplomacy.

I believe that the point of Silver Tongued is that you already max out Diplomacy and Bluff and then get 2 more points over that. Meaning that your Diplomacy and Bluff are the same as those of a "skilled" character 2 levels above you. And, in exchange, you are maxing out one less skill.

For any social character, this is very good. And that is without even taking into account the +1 max shift in attitude.

I honestly believe that Silver Tongued is worth at least green for such a character.

You make a good point. I'll fix that.

Liberty's Edge

I must say that I love the job you did with this Guide. It really is a very nice addition to the Guides and a good way to complement the Classes Guides.

I am eagerly waiting for your analysis of the Kitsune :-)

Silver Crusade RPG Superstar 2014 Top 16

The black raven wrote:

I must say that I love the job you did with this Guide. It really is a very nice addition to the Guides and a good way to complement the Classes Guides.

I am eagerly waiting for your analysis of the Kitsune :-)

I'll do my best to get to it soon! It will definitely involve some discussion of charm spells and the like. :-D


in the dhampir section you have paladin listed in orange, which is fine, but the negative energy affinity actually makes them a really good choice for antipaladins because they have the ability to heal themselves as regular paladins do
i would list antipaladin in at least green


This guide is greatly appreciated. I am not that great at realizing synergy between classes, traits, archetypes ...etc.

I find this very helpful. Not to look a gift horse in the mouth ... but are there plans to finish off the races from the new race guide?

Would be great to see a work up on goblins ... love those little bastards!

Silver Crusade RPG Superstar 2014 Top 16

Amric wrote:

This guide is greatly appreciated. I am not that great at realizing synergy between classes, traits, archetypes ...etc.

I find this very helpful. Not to look a gift horse in the mouth ... but are there plans to finish off the races from the new race guide?

Would be great to see a work up on goblins ... love those little bastards!

I've now added the drow to the guide! I think I will do goblins next just because of how many people love them (including me!)


Yay goblins!! As a side note, I plan on writing up a huge post on my findings, minor mistakes, sugestions and whatnot that I notice here in the next day or so like I did for the first iteration of the race guide and the bloodline guide, do you want it here or as a private pm?
Also, good job so far and again, looking forward to goblins!


WARNING: Extremely long post ahead

You have been warned…

Hey guys, hey Cartmanbeck, I read over your guide and I really like what I am seeing there. It is concise, informative, well written and was enjoyable to read. While I was reading over it, I kept notes on things I saw and here are my findings. I have organized everything into 3 sections, Spell Check and Minor Additions, Rating Changes, and Big Changes. I hope you see this for what I intend it to be, constructive and not harsh, helpful and not overbearing (it is long), and generally useful to you. I really enjoyed your guide on sorcerer bloodlines and have enjoyed this one immensely as well. Keep up the good work!
PS: I also really look forward to seeing goblins come out, and have quite a few opinions and ideas on what you could do for that one, but that must come later ;)
Well this turned out longer than I intended, so I am going to have to split it up a bit

Spell check and minor additions
1. In gnome, classes, paladin, third line, 5th word says 5yh and instead should say 5th
2. Half-elf, prestige classes, rage prophet, second line, 7th word says taht and instead should say that
3. Dampir, opening paragraph, first line, 17th word says wel and should say well
4. Tiefling, racial favored class options, needs a space in between Sorcerer entry and Summoner entry
5. Tiefling, prestige classes, aspis agent, url does not work; I believe Aspis Agent is indeed Guide Agent. Mistake? Just bringing it to your attention
6. Elf, classes, druid, 5th line, 4th word, moon caller druids gain Darkvision at second level
7. Alternate racial traits, catfolk, damphir, tiefling; missing what traits they replace
8. Tiefling, variant heritages, demodand-spawn, missing stats, specifically Con and Wisdom, possibly replace second half of first sentence: a bit wild and not interested in book-smarts but tough and passionate. With: a bit wild and not interested in book-smarts but tough and passionate due to increased con and Wisdom.
9. tiefling, variant heritages, asura-spawn, add Gunslingers to the list of classes that this heritage is good for
10. Half-orc, racial feats, deathless initiate, it is worth mentioning the Unbreakable Fighter as a great 1 level dip to get past the feat tax
11. half-orc, racial feats, razortusk, There are 4 ways for a half-orc to gain a bite attack, 1 feat, 1 alternate race trait and 2 race traits. As such spending a feat on something you can get amply elsewhere is not a good feat. The four ways are Toothy, Mothers Teeth, Razortusk, and tusked (sorry I don’t have a link for Tusked, here are some links pertaining to it; Traits Guide, commentary, karui kage and The atlantis blog. Sorry I have no actual links tho :(
12. Elves, racial archetypes, treesinger, * I was going to add one here about the Treesingers ability to wildshape and the limits on what he can summon, but it looks like I will have to do more research first. So saving this spot for another time!

Section 2, Rating Changes
In this section I will be talking about my suggested changes to some of the entries and why I feel they need to be changed. Hopefully I will convince you of my intent and/or reasoning but feel free to ignore anything in this next section or bring a counter argument! Disclaimer: This is only my opinion.

1. Human, racial favored class bonuses, barbarian, Superstition is a great power to have for just about any barbarian, even more so for humans and dwarves as it essentially allows you to become super resistant to the vast majority of effects that require a save. A level 2 human barbarian with superstition would have the same saves of a level 7 barbarian and a 4th level barbarian would have the saves of a 11th or 12th level barbarian. A human barbarian at 4th level would almost have the saves of a 15th level barbarian. That is a HUGE increase to survivability. The Superstition power also is a prerequisite to some other powerful powers that, while you don’t have to take them, ARE generally powerful or optimal. This is also why it is so good for a dwarf as well, cause a level 2 dwarf with the steel soul feat and glory of old trait would have +7 to his saves, or a level 10 character on his bad saves and a level 16 character on his good saves. At level 2. As such, I would suggest keeping this as a straight blue, possibly a sky blue for humans, but probably just a blue.

2. half-elf, alternate racial traits, ancestral arms, This one is not AS good as it seems. If you compare a human and a half-elf, a human gets +1 feat, +1 skill and +2 ability score. A half-elf gets a select feat (skill focus), a bonus to a select skill (perception), +2 ability score and a few other things (immunities, low-light vision, multitalented). They trade versatility for some extra goodies, but for the most part are similar, extra feat, extra skills, +2 ability score, versatility. Ancestral arms does not actually give you a feat, it just replaces one and is no different from a human who selects exotic weapon proficiency as his first feat, and that is not really that great for the human. It is still nice, but I would not rate it blue, probably green.

3. Half-elf, classes, summoner AND half-elf, racial archetypes, wild caller, You gave the First Worlder archetype a blue and the Wild Caller a yellow based on the First Worlder being better at summon nature’s ally. This is true, but let me point something out, first, you can only have your eidolon or a SNA out on the field at a time, they are mutually exclusive, and second, the Wild Caller focuses on your eidolon at the expense of your SNA abilities while the First Worlder focuses on your SNA abilities at the expense of your eidolon. The First Worlder gets an improved SNA due to an increased list he can chose from but at the cost of his eidolon having reduced hps, BAB and senses. The Wild Caller only gets the basic SNA while improving his eidolons power at the cost of its versatility. The main discrepancy between the two is the loss of versatility and even that is not as much of a downsize as it is a small limiter. You can easily build an eidolon that is powerful within those limitations.
Saying that the First Worlder is better than the Wild Caller because it does its improved ability better than the other does its secondary ability is unfair, and especially does not warrant a 2 rating drop. I would suggest making them both blue, or making them both green if you feel strongly about it. I would also suggest writing something to the effect of; The Wild Caller is an excellent archetype for those looking to make a strong and flavorful eidolon, but it comes at the price of weaker summoning abilities, trading out extra evolutions for a weaker Summon Natures Ally ability. Alternatively you can take the archetype First Worlder if you wish to focus more on your summoning skills as you gain a more varied SNA at the cost of a significantly weaker eidolon. Regardless of what one you choose make sure to take the half-elf favored class option to improve your eidolon even further!
PS you rated the First Worlder a blue in the summoner paragraph and a green in the Wild Caller paragraph.

4. Half-orc, racial archetypes, hateful rager, I dunno about this archetype, I just cant see the benefits of it. You actually give up A LOT more than just a round of rage every level and the benefits you gain just don’t seem to be worth it or even that powerful. Lets go through it step by step. 1 you loose a round of rage every level (and why someone who is fostering a deep, burning hatred that they channel into a raw fury and unleash against their enemies gets less rage is beyond me), 2 you lose out your first rage power and every third rage power to gain a favored enemy (this is two-fold, because you loose your first rage power, you cant actually get rage powers until level 4 and cannot select the extra rage power feat until level 5, and you get less rage powers overall, 2 instead of 3 by 6th level, 3 instead of 5 at 10th level, and 6 instead of 10 at 20th level, a fairly significant drop). 3 when you rage, you actually have chances to lose control of your PC if you are fighting in an encounter with your favored enemy, ie you run past the orcs in front of you to get to the hated human archer in the back, possibly eating AoO’s on the way or, even worse, leaving your party behind to get surrounded and failing as a meatshield. Generally effects that make you lose control are not well recieved. 4 When you DO kill a favored enemy, you get a bonus rage round, yay! Sadly it goes away when you finish raging, so if it was the last enemy, it was useless, if you manage to ragecycle, it is useless and you only gave up being unable to be flanked to get it (which would be very useful if you are forced to run into a crowd like above). In short as long as there are more guys around you get to keep the minor benefit temporarily, so situational at best. 5 At 9th level you can add half of your favored enemy bonus to your power DCs. What powers can you use this with? Well there 8 of them, 2 useful ones (terrifying howl and intimidating glare) and 3 flavorful ones (hurling, ground breaker and energy eruption). So if you want to build an intimidating build, you can add +2 to the DC against 2 types of targets till level 13! Just remember you get less rage powers from above and all it cost you was +1 dodge bonus against traps, so small gain for small loss. The real kicker is that it excludes you from taking some archetypes like the elemental kin, superstitious or the true primitive archetypes.
So lets recap, you gain favored enemy, situational rage rounds and a minor boost to a select few rage powers. What do you lose? Rage rounds, 1st rage power, occasional rage powers, periodic control of your PC, immunity to flanking, +1 trapsense and restricted ability to multiclass because of loss of trapsense. So I just cant see the uses of the class, and the more I look at it, the worse it seems BUT I haven’t actually played the class, so maybe someone who has can shed some light on its strengths?

powers that work with your favored enemy bonus:

Terrifying Howl, Hive Totem Toxicity, Hurling, Intimidating Glare, Boasting Taunt, Crippling Blow, Energy Eruption, Ground Breaker.
Terrifying Howl and Intimidating Glare are useful, Ground Breaker, Hurling and Energy Eruption are fun and actually benefit from this but Energy Eruption cant be taken till level 16, the rest just are not used often or are next to useless.

5. Half-orc, racial favored class bonuses, fighter, Hmmm… This one is just bad no matter how I look at it. First of all, Deathless Inniate has diehard as a prerequisite, so if you have that, you automatically stabilize so its completely useless for that. Second of all, stabilizing is only a DC 10 Con check, so anything past 5 ranks is, again, useless. As fighters tend to have at lest some Con, the ranks in this you need is even less. Keep this one pure red. You might want to suggest taking 1 or 2 ranks in this, but otherwise just take the hp.

6. Half-orc, racial archetypes, blood god disciple, Largely I agree on what you have to say for this class, there are just some things I would like to add. Firstly your eidolon eating corpses is not an inherently evil act any more than a wolf eating a carcass or a vulture eating one is. If you think about it, telling your pet to eat a dead animal/person should be less evil than telling him to bite (aka eat) a live one. I can understand the point of view, I just disagree with it. Next is dismissing your eidolon to begin raging, while neat thematically it is executed horribly mechanically. You dismiss your eidolon, so hes gone, you cannot use Summon Monster because you gave it up, you cannot cast spells because you are raging so what are you going to do with your medium BAB your light armor and your simple weapon with your most likely middling str score? Charge the thing that killed your eidolon tank? Same with the rage powers, what possible benefit could you come up with in that situation Especially in the high levels when he gets it? I love the flavor and idea, but it just tanks hard mechanically. Id say give it a red, or at best a yellow because of flavor.

7. Damphir, classes, summoner, You suggest taking the synthesist archetype because you replace your physical scores, just remember you do not actually replace your Con score, you combine the two. Just like how you rated the elven synthesist yellow because of the con drop, I would suggest the same here. Although I do agree it is quite flavorful.

8. Tiefling, classes, gunslinger, Rate SKYBLUE!! Tieflings make incredible gunslingers simply because of the tail. It is that good. People are willing to take a 2 level dip in alchemist for the sole reason of getting an extra arm or take an obscure race (vanaras) JUST to get that option. The fact that you can get a heritage that grants bonuses to dex and wis (Asura) is icing on the cake. Some of the best builds involve two-weapon fighting with pistols and the tail makes that feasible without resorting to questionable rules (weapon cords), painful dips (alchemist) or just straight GM fiat. Later on I plan on talking about the gunslinger at length and this will be brought up again. Skyblue.

9. Android, racial traits, nanite surge, I would also recommend this one for skyblue for the same reason that the human feat Inexplicable luck got Skyblue. There are also more times when you would want to use that ability like when you are dying and need to make that stabilization roll, you need to get that charm monster through spell resistance, keeping you from failing that dominate person spell, making sure you get first on the initiave roll, there are so many uses for this AND you get it for free unlike paying 2 feats for it like a human.

10. Android, classes, barbarian, You state that an android should not be a barbarian and for good reasons. Now I urge you to look deeper at it, notice that raging itself is not a moral bonus, just the increase in str, con and will save is. This means that you can still rage and still gain the benefits of rage powers despite not getting the str/con bonuses. While some rage powers like superstition are moral bonuses, others like strength surge, spell sunder, beast totem or come and get me will work just fine. It gets better, because of your construct traits, you are immune to fatigue and can rage cycle from level 1 making some combos that would otherwise not work till mid/late levels feasible from the get go. Also because of your powerful nanite surge ability, you can do some interesting and otherwise hard to pull off combos. You also have full range to the barbarian’s archetypes like taking invulnerable rager to make a tough, hard to hurt robot. If flavoring is an issue, just explain it as the machines coding makes it attack with a single tasked and highly efficient machine-like calm that allows no other actions like sneaking or spellcasting till the task is done. Just because it isn’t obvious does not mean it cant work! I would rate a green.

Phew! Next is section 3, Big Changes.


The suspense for the Goblin race guide is killing me. I requested, in the advice part, a few goblin build idea's.

Gonna hold out as long as possible for the gobo guide is hopes of making an uber goblin .... something or other!!!


I got sidetracked and busy this week but I will finish my evaluation tomorrow and then do a writeup of the goblin.
Btw you can make uber goblins! They are actually a powerful race with powerful goblin only toys and some of the most fun and flavourful abilities! For instance, you can pretend to be a football and gain a potent escape ability at the same time. Goblin alchemists can do great damage with bonus damage to bombs, high dex, bonus to bomb level, ROCKET BOMBS, andburning hands. Goblin gunslingers can be amazing with the high dex and ability to use medium sized weapons. They really can do there roles well.


Great guide overall!

I have to disagree about the Dwarven Craftsman trait. I'd recommend orange, and here is why. While the practical uses are uncommon, it's a lot better than greed, IMO. Also, I was able to get some circumstance bonuses on occasion for other skill checks because I was trained in related craft/profession skill. This obviously depends on your GM, but it worth considering.

Similarly, if you are playing a dwarven caster, Breadth of Experience feat is just awesome. I'd use a split rating for this one.


Section 3, Big Changes
In this section I will talk about 2 larger areas in your guide, the first one an omission, and the second one just plain wrong. The first one is the Halfling set of feats dealing with jinxes and the second one is the gunslinger as a whole.

1. Halfling Jinx Feats You mention about the Halfling jinx feats in the Halfling entry and highlight on them in the witch class entry, you don’t list them all or do them justice. I imagine this was because the jinxes are not in the racial feats section, but a quick browse through the general feats page brought these 10 feats to my attention. Arcane Jinxer, Area Jinx, Bolster Jinx, Distant Jinx, Fascination Jinx, Jinx Alchemy,
Malicious Eye, Sluggish Jinx, Versatile Jinxer and Worst Case Jinx. I am going to go through them and rank them on what my opinion of them should be so feel free to use this how you will, or debate it, that works to :)

First a bit about jinxes.
Halflings can replace there racial +1 luck bonus to all saves for the ability to jinx a target, friend or foe, with a debilitating curse that imparts a -1 penalty to all its saves. The save DC is 10 +1/2 character level +Char modifier. While minor, this ability can be boosted or altered through specific feats that can make it actually quite useful and very flavorful. The following feats alter jinxes.

Arcane Jinxer. Blue. Arcane casters only. This one allows you to sacrifice spell slots to reduce the saves of your opponent when resisting the jinx. Actually quite decent in the mid levels, as offering a level 3 spell will dramatically affect his ability to resist. Great for Charisma based casters (sorcerers, summoners and to a lesser extent, bards)

Area Jinx. Green. Requires Widen Spell. This changes your jinx from a target to a burst targetable anywhere in your range allowing you to affect multiple targets in close proximity. The feat tax to get this is noticeable unless you planned on getting widen spell anyways and as such, lowers this from a blue to a green.

Bolster Jinx. Blue. Requires Great Fortitude, Iron Will or Lightning Reflexes. Increases the penalty by the same amount you gain from its corresponding feat. Since those are good feats to have anyways, this is a pretty good feat. A -3 will save is a great debuff.

Distant Jinx. Yellow. This one doubles the range of your jinx allowing you to stay further away from combat and still jinx or makes it easier to jinx while hiding (assuming you can hide while jinxing, as there is nothing that says it alerts your target to your jinx attempt). Just generally not worth it unless you are a debuffer or controller and don’t want to get close, but there are better feats.

Fascination Jinx. Red. Requires Bardic Performance. This allows you to hit a creature already affected by your fascinate ability with a -1 to saves and a -10 to initiative. Lame. First you have to fascinate a target as a standard action allowing it a will save, then you have to affect it by this jinx as another standard action allowing it another save just to give it -10 initiative. Super situational. Also, you must be a bard.

Jinx Alchemy. Yellow. Requires Swift Alchemy, Lvl 3. This neat little jinx prevents those you jinx from drinking anything beneficial for the next 24 hours. Sadly it does not stop them from eating or drinking normal food so you can’t use it to starve someone to death. While neat that you can prevent someone from drinking any healing potions or the like, that healing usually comes from wands. Might be useful for a NPC going up against a Drunken master monk. Do note that you CAN use this against your fellow fighter and laugh at him, as he can no longer get drunk. Sadly I just can’t rate it high, so it gets yellow purely for flavor.

Malicious Eye. Blue. requires Evil Eye hex. This one is actually really good for a witch that intends to evil eye enemies and then cackle away. A creature that fails against a evil eye hex automatically gets affected by the jinx, no second will save, no immunity for 24 hours because he does not actually roll to save, you can jinx multiple targets at a single time and you can still use your regular jinx unimpeded. The fact that witches focus on Intelligence and not Charisma doesn’t even matter as Charisma is no longer needed. Stack it with Bolster jinx and you can get some really good debuffs going.

Sluggish Jinx. Red. Your jinx also affects your targets initiative and attack rolls. Not really that great considering its most noticeable effect is only -1 to attack rolls. If you stack it with bolster jinx, then you would have an argument for a -3 to attack rolls being decent but you are better off staying away from this feat.

Versatile Jinxer. Blue/Yellow. Requires Iron Will. Changes your DC to Int based or Wis based. Works well with the bolster jinx feat for Int based characters. Otherwise you are looking at 2 feats just to change the DC type of your jinx. This allows non-Cha based characters to get better benefit from the jinxes but at a high cost so is more flavorful than optimal.

Worst Case Jinx. Red. requires 5 ranks of Knowledge-Arcana. This makes all beneficial variable gains for the jinxed target count as the lowest amount. Could be useful for the witch jinxer to keep the targets she hexes from gaining meaningful buffs but would mostly be regaled to NPCs casting it on the PCs causing them to waste more charges healing.

There, the jinx feats are done, and I see a Halfling witch jinxer/debuffer being an interesting and functional build.

.

.

2. Gunslinger Class You have mentioned that you have never played the gunslinger class and as such you are not very experienced with it. That is fine but I must warn you that your advice you are giving out in regards to the gunslinger classes is generally wrong and very underpowered. Since this is an optimization guide mind if I give you some advice on how a good gunslinger works and how a (X race) gunslinger can be effective?

For the gunslinger, there are 2 main groups of builds that are considered optimal, the Dual Wielding Pistols group and the Single Gun group (ie a musket or a single pistol). The DWP group focuses on getting 2 pistols and firing them both with Two Weapon Fighting feats and generally maximizing the number of attacks you can get. A mainstay weapon for this is the double barreled pistol because it allows you to fire 2 shots for every attack you have. 1 attack gives you 2, Two Weapon Fighting gives you 4, BAB 5 and Improved Two Weapon Fighting gives you 8 and bab 10 with Greater Two Weapon Fighting gives you a whopping 12 attacks. This group has 3 main disadvantages; cost, reloading and misfire chance as well as being quite feat intensive.

Cost. Cost is quite easy to see, a double barreled pistol costs 1750 gp a gun, black powder costs 10 gp a shot, bullets cost 1 gp a shot while alchemical cartridges cost 12 gp a shot. Since you need alchemical cartridges to reduce reloading down to a free action, you are almost forced into using them to get your multiple shots. This means you are looking at a 3500 gp down payment for your guns and 11-22 gp per shot. When you are firing 2 shots a pistol and multiple times per pistol you are literally shooting gold at your enemies, capable of shooting 164 gp worth of bullets a round at level 10. Cost can be a huge limiting factor to this build. Luckily there is the gunsmithing feat.

Reloading. Reloading a 1 handed firearm is a standard action, rapid reload makes this a move action, alchemical cartridges reduces this to a free action, often necessitating them to fire quickly. This is fine and standard, the problem comes from needing 1 free hand to reload firearms and TWF. Why Piazo made you required to jump through these hoops to reload is beyond me, but its there. Weapon cords can allow you to drop a weapon as a free action so your hand is free and retrieve it as a swift, but is filled with grey areas that you have to work with your dm to come to a conclusion and it is such a convulted system to make the most out of it. The alternative is to somehow grow a third arm, enter the alchemist. 2 levels of alchemist can grant you the vestigial arm discovery to get that crucial third arm but it costs you 2 levels to get it (effectively costing you an arm and a leg -_-). The only other option is to be 1 of 2 races that grant you a tail, the Vanara or the Tiefling. Considering that the Vanara is an unfeatured race, you are kinda left with the Tiefling. Hence the Tiefling makes a great gunslinger as he can save 2 levels of a multiclass because of his tail.

Missfire Chance. Consider that all guns have a misfire chance of 1 or greater, double barreled guns have a misfire of 2, and alchemical cartriges increase that by 1 while the broken condition increases that by a further 2. Firing at full speed means you have a 15% chance to misfire on each of your bullets and if you are firing multiple times with 2 bullets a shot, it becomes increasingly likely that you will misfire over an extended period of time. When you do misfire your gun breaks, increasing the chances of it misfiring to 25%, and if you misfire a second time, it is destroyed. This means that if you decide to full attack with both guns blazing you could quite easily come out with a broken or exploding gun or two.
There are a few things you can do to reduce your chance to misfire, you could put the reliable enchantment onto a gun to reduce it by 1, but would have to enchant both guns to do so making it expensive. Pistol training and musket training from the pistolero and musket master archetypes allow you to never misfire after lvl 13, a mysterious stranger can cancel misfires a number of times equal to her cha bonus at 5th level and a dwarfs favored class bonus can reduce the misfire chance by ¼ allowing you to be ‘safer’ sooner.

The Single Gun group focuses on using a single gun and is generally more balanced. Two handed weapons generally have more damage per shot, shoot farther and cost more. This second group looks more like a bow wielder, he fires smaller, more powerful vollys, often aiming to snipe targets from further away, is more rounded and has almost none of the weaknesses that the first group has. You also don’t have to worry about the multiple hands issue of the first group. For all intents and purposes this is the standard gunslinger, although the musket master archetype is a better gunslinger than the standard gunslinger class in this regards.

Archetypes. When it comes to archetypes, you often suggest the Mysterious Stranger as the go-to when comparing if races are good for the gunslinger class and this is a poor standard. The Mysterious Stranger is the worst archetype you could possibly chose and is even worse than the standard gunslinger class. The main reason is the gun training ability and its replacements. A gun gains no increased damage based on any of your stats like a bow or a sword would so its damage can remain relatively more static than some other classes would. The gun training ability adds your dex mod in damage to all ranged attacks making you quite single stat dependent. Of the 4 archetypes, Gun tank retains the original, Pistolero and Musket Master has a modified and better version, while the Mysterious Stranger has to spend grit to get it. A swift action and grit every turn... Since this is normally impossible you have to wait till lvl 11 and then spend a feat on Signature Deed, so this ends up costing you all your swift actions, all your grit up till level 11 then it costs you a feat, just to equal the base classes gun training and what do you get in return? The ability to ignore misfires. While good, the tradeoff just is not worth it, especially if you don’t go TWF and if you DO go TWF the Pistolero class is better for that. Then to make it worse, Pistolero and Musket Master both ignore misfires after level 13 anyways. How much damage is this ability anyway? Well dex mod to shot is probably going to be 5 (20 dex) for a focused dex character, so that’s 5 damage a hit or 10, 15 damage for a two-handed gun so not much. For a dual wielding Pistolero, that is 10 damage per gun (2 barrels) with 2 guns or an extra 40 damage at level 5, and if you add more dex items so your dex is 26, an extra 96 damage at level 10. A huge boost in damage.

The Mysterious Stranger archetype is flavorful, just not very strong mechanically. What you should look at is the Pistolero and the Musket Master as a comparison for your classes, Musket Master has fast musket which is the only way to improve a 2 handed guns reloading to a free action, so is almost mandatory for anyone looking to use 2 handed guns unless they are ok with 1 shot a round. Pistolero is for someone looking to go with a 1 handed gun or dual wielding guns as it ups your damage considerably and later ignores misfires.

To recap, there is almost no reason not to go Musket Master or pistolero as both are more effective than the base class and that the Mysterious Stranger is flavorful but ultimately a trap.

Great races for gunslingers;
Tiefling: #1 bonus to dex and wis, darkvision, prehensile tail makes this the top gunslinger
Dwarf: gains reductions to misfire due to FCB makes your gun less likely to explode in your face. Very good despite no dex bonus, darkvision
Halflings: gains dex bonus, small size and good favored class bonus granting extra ac
Asimar: Grauda blooded bonus to dex and wisdom, see invisibility, darkvision

Average races for gunslingers;
Elf: bonus to dex is good, nothing else specially worth noting
Gnome: no good stat bonuses but racial archetype is decent and FCB is semi useful
Half-Elf: Floating bonus is good, extra grit is good
Half-Orc: Floating bonus is good, darkvision is good, FCB is crap
Human: Floating bonus is good, FCB is good, lack of enhanced vision sucks

Please, please, please strike all mention of the Mysterious Stranger archetype from the guide and replace it with either the Pistolero or the Musket master archetype as it is such bad advice.

KKK thats done, up next will be my take on the Goblin race! I'm doing this one extra just because I reallly like Goblins and have found lots of good things about them ever since I started playing. When the advanced race guide came out, they got even better! So look forward to it!


Just wanted to drop by and say I really dig this guide!

Liberty's Edge

@ Gobo Horde : what about the Jinxed Spell metamagic feat ?


I am very much looking forward to seeing samsaran listed and dealt with. Quite a unique race, and one of my favorites.


Half-elven Magi can learn Paragon Surge too. If they choose Extra Arcana as a feat, this means that they may cast ANY WIZARD SPELL (and with 3PP arcanas, any Witch or bard spell too)


Cartmanbeck?? Are you there? Please come back and bring the promised Goblin section with you :)

Silver Crusade RPG Superstar 2014 Top 16

Amric wrote:
Cartmanbeck?? Are you there? Please come back and bring the promised Goblin section with you :)

WOW! I got busy at work and TOTALLY hadn't checked the thread for way too long!

Okay, so I've started updating with some of Gobo Horde's smaller suggestions. I'll read through more of the larger ones tomorrow. I will DEFINITELY attack goblins sometime this week. I'm so sorry I was away, and I LOVE that you guys like my guide so much!!


I do love your race guide Cartman.
Not as racist as I was hoping, but it's still absolutely awesome, and does remind us all that half-orcs are friggin amazingly versatile.


Pathfinder Adventure, Rulebook Subscriber

Can you put a link to this discussion thread in the guide? that way it's easier to find this thread if you have a question or suggestion.

Silver Crusade RPG Superstar 2014 Top 16

j b 200 wrote:
Can you put a link to this discussion thread in the guide? that way it's easier to find this thread if you have a question or suggestion.

Done!

Silver Crusade RPG Superstar 2014 Top 16

Gobo Horde wrote:

WARNING: Extremely long post ahead

You have been warned…

Hey guys, hey Cartmanbeck, I read over your guide and I really like what I am seeing there. It is concise, informative, well written and was enjoyable to read. While I was reading over it, I kept notes on things I saw and here are my findings. I have organized everything into 3 sections, Spell Check and Minor Additions, Rating Changes, and Big Changes. I hope you see this for what I intend it to be, constructive and not harsh, helpful and not overbearing (it is long), and generally useful to you. I really enjoyed your guide on sorcerer bloodlines and have enjoyed this one immensely as well. Keep up the good work!
PS: I also really look forward to seeing goblins come out, and have quite a few opinions and ideas on what you could do for that one, but that must come later ;)
Well this turned out longer than I intended, so I am going to have to split it up a bit

Spell check and minor additions
1. In gnome, classes, paladin, third line, 5th word says 5yh and instead should say 5th
2. Half-elf, prestige classes, rage prophet, second line, 7th word says taht and instead should say that
3. Dampir, opening paragraph, first line, 17th word says wel and should say well
4. Tiefling, racial favored class options, needs a space in between Sorcerer entry and Summoner entry
5. Tiefling, prestige classes, aspis agent, url does not work; I believe Aspis Agent is indeed Guide Agent. Mistake? Just bringing it to your attention
6. Elf, classes, druid, 5th line, 4th word, moon caller druids gain Darkvision at second level
7. Alternate racial traits, catfolk, damphir, tiefling; missing what traits they replace
8. Tiefling, variant heritages, demodand-spawn,...

Hi Gobo!

I read through all of your suggestions here, and made MANY of them. There are a few I don't agree with, though.

You suggest that I should rethink the Android Barbarian option because rage gives straight bonuses. While you can still benefit from many rage powers, the lack of the +4 to Strength and Con just doesn't lend itself to be a good option, so I'm going to keep this one red.

I have no idea how I completely missed the Halfling Jinx feats, but if you're okay with it, I've pasted your suggestions for those feats directly into the guide (with a nod to you, of course!)

I have also read through your Gunslinger stuff, and I just really can't understand why you think Mysterious Stranger is so terrible. There are a LOT of races that have boosts to Charisma, and for those races, if you want to play as a Gunslinger, how could you not want to use a Charisma-based archetype?

I think one fundamental thing you're not getting about my guide is that it's a guide to optimizing the RACE, not the CLASS. I definitely agree that if you want to play a Gunslinger, some races are better than others. BUT, if you are starting with the RACE as the important part (which is what this guide is about), then the Mysterious Stranger archetype is the only one that makes sense for some of the races (such as the Gnome).

Given all of that, seriously thank you for your help with all of this. Your suggestions were all very good and extremely helpful!

Silver Crusade RPG Superstar 2014 Top 16

1 person marked this as a favorite.

Goblins have now been added to the guide! Check it out here:
Cartmanbeck's Guide to Pathfinder Races


1 person marked this as a favorite.

You sir are a good man, I will name a child after you ..... wait Cartmanbeck would be a dumb name for a kid, scratch that I will make it a name of a character.


You didn't actually assign a color to the Rogue option under the Goblin's Racial Favored Class Options. I assume it to be light blue, based on your commentary.

I am really enjoying your guide!


dot

Silver Crusade RPG Superstar 2014 Top 16

The Crusader wrote:

You didn't actually assign a color to the Rogue option under the Goblin's Racial Favored Class Options. I assume it to be light blue, based on your commentary.

I am really enjoying your guide!

Fixed!


Are you going to add kobolds, or are they just horrible and I should feel bad for liking them?

I can guess that their strong points would be spellcasting or ranged attacks, thanks to their Str and Con penalties and Dex bonus. No mental boosts or losses here.


Voyd211 wrote:

Are you going to add kobolds, or are they just horrible and I should feel bad for liking them?

I can guess that their strong points would be spellcasting or ranged attacks, thanks to their Str and Con penalties and Dex bonus. No mental boosts or losses here.

Seconded

Silver Crusade RPG Superstar 2014 Top 16

Voyd211 wrote:

Are you going to add kobolds, or are they just horrible and I should feel bad for liking them?

I can guess that their strong points would be spellcasting or ranged attacks, thanks to their Str and Con penalties and Dex bonus. No mental boosts or losses here.

I was actually going to wait to do Kobolds after "Kobolds of Golarion" comes out in like a month. I'm sure there will be a lot of new options in that book that will sway my optimization decisions.


Have you considered adding the Drow Noble, if only to make fun of how completely and totally broken they are?

Silver Crusade RPG Superstar 2014 Top 16

Voyd211 wrote:
Have you considered adding the Drow Noble, if only to make fun of how completely and totally broken they are?

The Drow Noble is just too powerful to ever be seriously considered as a player race. I might throw in a blurb at the start of the Drow section just saying "Don't ever let your players play as Drow Nobles. Ever." or something like that. LOL


Also, there are several races not covered that are permitted by Pathfinder Society that you missed. Specifically, the other five kinds of Planetouched (fetchlings, ifrits, oreads, sylphs and undines), nagaji, wayangs, kitsune, and tengu.

I know from reading that Wayangs would be surprisingly good for a melee race. It's a Small race without a Strength penalty!

Silver Crusade RPG Superstar 2014 Top 16

Voyd211 wrote:

Also, there are several races not covered that are permitted by Pathfinder Society that you missed. Specifically, the other five kinds of Planetouched (fetchlings, ifrits, oreads, sylphs and undines), nagaji, wayangs, kitsune, and tengu.

I know from reading that Wayangs would be surprisingly good for a melee race. It's a Small race without a Strength penalty!

Oh I know, I'll get to them. I'm juggling writing my PhD dissertation with a bunch of other stuff right now, so I'll try to get a new race up each week or so for a while, but that's probably the most I'll be able to accomplish for at least a few months.


Alright then. Which one are you currently working on, if anything?

Also, do you plan on doing all of them? If so, to that I say fair luck to thee, great one.

Silver Crusade RPG Superstar 2014 Top 16

Voyd211 wrote:
Alright then. Which one are you currently working on, if anything?

Hadn't started on another one at the moment, but I will have time later today to do so. Do you have a request? I was thinking maybe I'd go straight down the list of "Featured" races, which would put Fetchling next, but I'm open to concentrating on ones that people want specifically.


Besides kobolds, I'd like to see what wayangs are good at. Small race with no Str penalty!


Just to say - well done! It looks good to me although in a gaming sense low-light vision and dark vision tend to be relevant in our games to the extent that we go around a dungeon 'lit up' rather than stealthy if we have a human in the group (which is always). So perhaps looking at the sense abilities when discussing a character might be relevant - it's the one big disadvantage humans have.

And good luck with the studies.


Are there any plans for samsarans in the near/distant/whatever future?

Silver Crusade RPG Superstar 2014 Top 16

At your suggestions, I'll attack Wayang and Samsaran right now!

Silver Crusade RPG Superstar 2014 Top 16

Wayangs are up, I don't have time for Samsaran at the moment but I'll get there soon!

51 to 100 of 448 << first < prev | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | next > last >>
Community / Forums / Pathfinder / Pathfinder First Edition / Advice / Cartmanbeck's Guide to Pathfinder Races All Messageboards

Want to post a reply? Sign in.