Pathfinder at least claims it's trying to avoid that, though. Archetypes are a great way to avoid the mess of Prestige Class complex interactions; Favored Class points incentivise staying single-classed, and in Ultimate Magic's treatise on designing new spells it says that spells should be compared against PCRB for the express reason of avoiding power creep.
You make sound points, but again, the sort of power creep you describe with the barbarian is inevitable to some extent, unless new options are crap across the board.
If you give people more choice and they always pick the best options, they will get more powerful even if the standard for a power doesn't rise. I'm not convinced it has risen at all, it's just there's so much stuff out there to choose from.
There is no way to manage it except to stop printing books or deliberately fill them with junk.
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Wat? You mean 'power creep' isnt the name of some 'optimized thief build'?
In that case I rate it 2 thumbs way up!
At least it's easier to fix with monsters -- a template can go a long way. Classed NPCs require better rewrites.
Paizo has a pretty good deal going on here, given that their Adventure Path forums are filled with friendly people eager to share how they tweaked NPCs. I've seen a decent number of people who shared how they changed stats to new materials, like Alchemist and Witch, in Kingmaker.
I wonder if people would be interested in some sort of repository filled with unofficial modifications to adventure paths. It would be useful for a GM running old APs to find how other GMs tweaked dated statblocks with new materials, and only being able to search boards for what you know you're looking for is tenuous.
I find that fans of Kungfu Fantasy Films/TV/Novels tend to find the book of nine swords more appealing then those who prefer more down to earth fantasy like Game of thrones or Tolkiens work.Yeah, Tolkien was all about really static combat where people constantly stood in one place not moving and pressing the full-attack button because it was the only way to deal decent damage. Anything that wouldn't fit in Game of Thrones breaks my verisimilitude, also I cast time stop.
Um, ok so the abstract and somewhat silly nature of the full attack advantage in 3.x has nothing to do with my point. Besides the fact that we are actually on the same side of the argument (I think fighters should be a able to do crazy things if they want to), tolkien certainly wasnt high fantsay when compared to current day dnd or pathfinder. The 'wizard' cast like 5 spells the whole adventure (which took like a year). Half of them being a light spell. Most of the magic is very subtle in the world and not overt (see fireball spell). Most of the story is about normal folks in normal armor swinging bits of metal and wood at eachother. Other then extreme combat skill and a rediculous amount of endurance, aragorn wasnt really capable of or display much above what a well trained humam could do.
And while that isnt the kind of fantasy game I want to play, it IS a part of the legacy of pathfinder. Look at the fighter. After how many years, he is as mundane as it gets. And people clamor like hell for him to stay that way. So there is a significant portion of the community that plays this game that LIKES that tolkien/game of thrones style subtle or barely present magic in their fantasy. For people like that (again not me) tome of battle is a potential elimination of what they like in the game. It is perfectly reasonable to reject that kind of game if its different from their prefered style.
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AD. You have ignored the comment...
"you need to take a look at your posting history and review it with unclouded eyes sir. It's quite distressing."Arrogance 101 = "I apologize for making you see what you said and how it came across to others."
Are you really reflecting what is "exactly going on here"?
By virtue of your response, you are no less rude and arrogant with lack of humility than Glutton or any poster.... and at this point myself.
Please bash me to heck. Likely I will never post or read this thread again.Ok flame war over....
As a GM of Mr. Glutton (a proud, and self exalting name of course vs. Adamantine Dragon, a name of humility); Glutton has come a long way to becoming a balanced player. Partially from taking on the critical and sometimes unrewarding (praise-wise) role as a DM.
He has definitely shown an accepting DM limitations and game adjustments.Sometimes his responses are knee-jerked. He apologized. Way to lay into the wound sir.
Oh those Interwebz.From my perspective
"Not allowing certain material into the game is not due to...
LOL, nice of you to come to the defense of one of your players number6. I hope he appreciates having a GM who looks out for him.
I have reviewed my posting history number6, and I find that a high percentage of my posts are "favorited" by members of these boards, and I find many, many posts where I express appreciation for other points of view. So I frankly don't agree that my posts are routinely rude or offensive.
However, I do concede that when someone posts something that I find objectionable, I don't have any problem "punching back twice as hard" to quote our inestimable occupant of the White House.
And since I can interpret Arrogantlish so easily, I must be fluent in the language myself. I fully acknowledge that I am no shrinking violet.
But Glutton's post was rude and directly asserted that players like me were inferior players.
So I took him to task for it.
Enough on this now. As I said, good for you that you care about your players.
Power creep is synonymous to power gaming.
If you're playing the game to its most min/maxing potential they you will certainly find loopholes and combinations that validate the notion of power creep.
That is not to say it doesn't happen, but I think it's FAR from prevalent in Pathfinder.
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Wizards are still stronger than anything released, so power creep seems pretty lowWizards have gotten stronger as the game progresses. Wizards benefits heavily from new spells because they can learn them all.
I don't think the average power level of the new spells really represents much power creep though. The big spells like Glitterdust, Stoneskin, Bestow Curse, Chain Lightning, Timestop, and numerous others are all right in the CRB.
A few classes like the Rogue and Monk and have seen pretty potent improvements with archetypes like the Zen Archer and Ninja, but overall an average party isn't capable of doing terribly much more in a given adventuring day now than they were a few years ago.
I'd say there's probably a few magic items that are just flat out better versions of existing for roughly the same price that represent real power creep (Bracers of Falcon’s Aim, I'm looking at you) but even those instances are fairly rare and isolated.
PF power creep hasn't yet reached the stratospheric levels of 3.5, but it's significant enough that it's already bugging the heck out of me.
Same here. If 1 were Core and 10 were on a level with the end days of 3.5, then I would rate PF right now between 6 and 7 - very noticeable power creep though still mostly tolerable by the basic game system. And personally anything higher than ~3 gets me antsy.
There's a bit of a different thing going on with PF as compared to 3.5 though. In 3.5 the heights of optimization were often about finding an arcane combination of seven different prestige classes where the obscure synergy of abilities would grant you ultimate power. PF seems to be much more comfortable with offering flat-out upgrades that don't need to be combined with anything else to be more powerful than Core. Dueling gloves, Reckless Abandon, etc don't rely on any arcane combos, they are just better than Core in and of themselves.
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Same here. If 1 were Core and 10 were on a level with the end days of 3.5, then I would rate PF right now between 6 and 7 - very noticeable power creep though still mostly tolerable by the basic game system. And personally anything higher than ~3 gets me antsy.
There's a bit of a different thing going on with PF as compared to 3.5 though. In 3.5 the heights of optimization were often about finding an arcane combination of seven different prestige classes where the obscure synergy of abilities would grant you ultimate power. PF seems to be much more comfortable with offering flat-out upgrades that don't need to be combined with anything else to be more powerful than Core. Dueling gloves, Reckless Abandon, etc don't rely on any arcane combos, they are just better than Core in and of themselves.
That's a pretty severe estimation considering your examples were a Rage power that isn't actually much more potent (if at all) than existing options (like Sudden Accuracy and Rage cycling, which core barbarians can do without the hit to AC), and a single magic item. I think you need more than 5 magic items to justify a 6 or 7 on a scale of 1-10 power creep.
One thing to keep in mind, PF core is like 3.5 core on performance enhancers. The PF core was specifically stated to be able to compete with some of the most advanced 3.5 power creeped material.
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I'm seeing no power creep at all here.
Weapon Cord hardly broken. I see no reason why I should waste a standard action picking up a dropped weapon when for one silver piece it's a swift action. Hardly going to break anyone games imo.
Quick Runners Shirt. If I have to spend 1000 gp on a suit of armor it better damn well give me something for my investment. Once a day and only once a day a person wearing the suit can take a move action. Again hardly game breaking or badly designed.
Muleback Cords I keep seeing posters say this is broken. For 1000 gp my strength score for carrying items and only carrying items is increased by 8. I can't use that extra strength for anything else. Not seeing how game breaking the item is. After all he maybe able to carry more yet he ability to use the extra gear is still limited to the action economy. Again for 1000 gp there better be a decent benefit.
i think too many Dms see the benefits yet not the limitations. Might as well outlaw wands of Ant Haul since they do much the same as Muleback Cords. Last two hours a level and is a first level spell.
That's a pretty severe estimation considering your examples were a Rage power that isn't actually much more potent (if at all) than existing options (like Sudden Accuracy and Rage cycling, which core barbarians can do without the hit to AC)Same here. If 1 were Core and 10 were on a level with the end days of 3.5, then I would rate PF right now between 6 and 7 - very noticeable power creep though still mostly tolerable by the basic game system. And personally anything higher than ~3 gets me antsy.
There's a bit of a different thing going on with PF as compared to 3.5 though. In 3.5 the heights of optimization were often about finding an arcane combination of seven different prestige classes where the obscure synergy of abilities would grant you ultimate power. PF seems to be much more comfortable with offering flat-out upgrades that don't need to be combined with anything else to be more powerful than Core. Dueling gloves, Reckless Abandon, etc don't rely on any arcane combos, they are just better than Core in and of themselves.
If you believe that Sudden Accuracy is as good as Reckless Abandon then I suspect we will have to agree to disagree. I don't see rage cycling Sudden Accuracy (at the cost of two rage rounds spent per round and your swift action) for a bonus to a single of your five attacks per round as a 17th level barbarian as anywhere near as good as having the same bonus to all of your attacks instead of one of them, at no extra cost in rage rounds and not taking up your swift action. The AC penalty is barely relevant to a 17th level barbarian.
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As for the requested four additional examples (Just for kicks, I'll limit this just to barbarians. Because there are enough examples that it's easy to find the requested number even while hedging out the entire game except a single class).
-furious weapon. Spend +1 to get +2. My experience is that our party's barbarian is raging between eight out of ten and nine out of ten hard fights - the odd one or two out there is something stopping him or very occasionally he is low on rage. So pretty much spend +1 enhancement to get the value of 2x.8 or .9=1.6 to 1.8 enhancement.
-compare Guarded Stance (core) to Beast Totem (APG). Guarded stance would give your 17th level barbarian +3 to AC for a few rounds if he spends a move action. It only applies against melee attacks. Beast totem will give him +5 to AC which is always on while raging and applies to both melee and ranged attacks. Applies when denied Dex, unlike a dodge bonus (and while a dodge bonus normally would have the benefit of applying to touch AC, the core power won't help the barbarian against rays and such since it is only against melee attacks). So it's a flat better bonus, plus doesn't cost you a full attack to activate, plus applies against more attacks. APG power is not only more powerful than the similar core power, it's a lot more powerful.
-compare Animal Fury (core) to Lesser Demon Totem (APG). Again, easily comparable rage powers since they each give you a natural attack.
Animal Fury gives you a 1d4 base damage attack. It can be used only as a secondary attack, which means it takes a -5 to hit and adds only half your Str mod.
Demon totem gives you a 1d8 base damage attack. It can be used on its own as a primary attack when necessary, with no attack penalty and dealing full Str. If you do want to use it as a secondary along with weapons - it still deals twice as much base damage.
And finally let's compare the two books' move-and-attack related powers. Each book offers one power intended to let the barbarian close in on and full attack a foe.
-No Escape (core) and Greater Beast Totem (APG).
No Escape will, once a rage, let you freely move up to an enemy under strict circumstances: they must have used the withdraw action and you must have already been adjacent when they did so. Which happens about once in a blue moon. If they do, you get to follow them at the cost of an immediate action, and you can take your full attack next turn.
Greater Beast Totem, of course, lets you full attack at the end of a charge whenever you are raging. It's even better than No Escape when following a withdrawing foe - since if you charge them you get +2, and it doesn't cost you your swift/immediate. And of course you can use it to get full attacks in dozens of other situations while No Escape is still waiting for that one withdrawing foe so it can be almost as good once as Greater Beast Totem always is.
So, moving back out of nuts and bolts... if you can demonstrate why the core examples are as or more powerful than their APG counterparts I will reconsider each of them. However, I'm not making an off the cuff judgment here as perhaps implied by the only one or two examples in my first post. My opinion on PF power creep has been born out of playing a high level game every Saturday since before APG came out, and getting a chance to see what each book adds to the game. It was more that I was making a short message board post and not really expecting to write an essay to back it up.
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All the silly gunslinger pistol builds use Weapon Cords.
Again one extra swift action to pick up a dropped weapon is hardly game breaking. It's a swift action to pick up the weapon.
There's nothing to stop you having multiple Quick Runner shirts.
Nothing says that you are allowed to wear more than one either. Or that your allowed to wear it over armor. Or that as a SM all you need to say is "no you can't have more than one quick runner shirt". Not to mention even if they wear more than one. That extra movement can be done only once a day. It's annoying yet hardly game breaking or abusive. A person using the item needs to rest 24 hours to use the bonus action action. A 8 hour rest is imo not going to cut it.
Altering action costs impacts on the mechanical system at the most fundamental level - ever item I've seen that allows this (I'd add paper cartridges too) appear unbalanced and open to abuse...
At most annoying and nothing a DM cannot control. Sure many items can be absued in the game. It's up to the DM to control them items. As well if the players are abusing certain items than have the NPC and monsters in your game use them too.
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Shirt is in the body slot. Not the armor slot. You can wear it with armor.I know that. Except I'm going to seriouly question why a player in my games would be layering more than one shirt. Let alone allow him to use more than one shirt.
The point they're making is that a 9th level character could buy a dozen of those shirts and switch them out between combats to have an extra move action every fight with no worries.
As a 1/day item the Quickrunners Shirt isn't bad, but it's so cheap that there's no reason not to have a pack full of them in various cuts and styles.|
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--compare Guarded Stance (core) to Beast Totem (APG). Guarded stance would give your 17th level barbarian +3 to AC for a few rounds if he spends a move action. It only applies against melee attacks. Beast totem will give him +5 to AC which is always on while raging and applies to both melee and ranged attacks. Applies when denied Dex, unlike a dodge bonus (and while a dodge bonus normally would have the benefit of applying to touch AC, the core power won't help the barbarian against rays and such since it is only against melee attacks). So it's a flat better bonus, plus doesn't cost you a full attack to activate, plus applies against more attacks. APG power is not only more powerful than the similar core power, it's a lot more powerful.
I like how you pick 17th instead of 18th where you get another point from Guarded Stance, but... Guarded Stance is available immediately, whereas the Beast totem armor bonus is not available until 6th level and requires the investment of the initial power in the chain. Guarded Stance shouldn't be as powerful, because it is a lower level ability, and is very useful early levels. Superstition, on the other hand, probably does far more to help a barbarian (and his party) survive at high levels than a natural armor bonus he could likely obtain from a low level party buff, and is in the CRB.
-compare Animal Fury (core) to Lesser Demon Totem (APG). Again, easily comparable rage powers since they each give you a natural attack.
Animal Fury gives you a 1d4 base damage attack. It can be used only as a secondary attack, which means it takes a -5 to hit and adds only half your Str mod.
Demon totem gives you a 1d8 base damage attack. It can be used on its own as a primary attack when necessary, with no attack penalty and dealing full Str. If you do want to use it as a secondary along with weapons - it still deals twice as much base damage.
You're just generally wrong here. The natural attack granted by Animal Fury is still a Primary Attack when it's the only attack you're making, just like the one from Fiend Totem. While the die damage is smaller, the attack from Animal Fury gives you a bonus to grappling and is not mutually exclusive to other totem powers like the fiend totem abilities (you can still choose a totem power from another totem like beast and use Animal Fury)
And finally let's compare the two books' move-and-attack related powers. Each book offers one power intended to let the barbarian close in on and full attack a foe.-No Escape (core) and Greater Beast Totem (APG).
No Escape will, once a rage, let you freely move up to an enemy under strict circumstances: they must have used the withdraw action and you must have already been adjacent when they did so. Which happens about once in a blue moon. If they do, you get to follow them at the cost of an immediate action, and you can take your full attack next turn.Greater Beast Totem, of course, lets you full attack at the end of a charge whenever you are raging. It's even better than No Escape when following a withdrawing foe - since if you charge them you get +2, and it doesn't cost you your swift/immediate. And of course you can use it to get full attacks in dozens of other situations while No Escape is still waiting for that one withdrawing foe so it can be almost as good once as Greater Beast Totem always is.
You're comparing apples and oranges here. No escape is an off-turn ability that helps you prevent enemies from... escaping.
The Greater Beast Totem Power is nice, and it certainly opens up additional builds for the Barbarian, but the damage you're getting isn't substantially greater than what a two-handed barbarian with the Vital Strike chain could accomplish using those rage power slots for other abilities, or what a charging paladin with a lance could already do with just the CRB abilities. It's a net gain for the Barbarian, but it doesn't change the basic balance paradigm between classes and capabilities.The Furious weapon property is certainly an improvement for the barbarian over the material listed in Core, but it's power scales hand in hand with the barbarian's and I don't see anything terribly wrong with that.
Ultimately though, I don't think the APG should be counted separately from the CRB in accounting for power creep. The CRB was Paizo's refinement and presentation of the content from the OGL, and what they could do was limited. The APG was Paizo actually getting to insert Paizo specific content to the game and finally make it theirs. The CRB and APG together really represent, for me at least, the baseline of the Pathfinder game.
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The point they're making is that a 9th level character could buy a dozen of those shirts and switch them out between combats to have an extra move action every fight with no worries.
I get the point. Maybe Im not seeing how broken it is. Sure a extra move is a good benefit. Not that game breaking. As for extra shirts all a DM has to do is limit it to one shirt or only one shirt. Or the sack holding the shirts gets burnt by fire or stolen by a rogue. Not to mention my monsters are going to be trageting the guy who keep switching in and out of shirts.
As a 1/day item the Quickrunners Shirt isn't bad, but it's so cheap that there's no reason not to have a pack full of them in various cuts and styles.
They are cheap yet a DM can always outlaw the item from the game. Not to mention if a melee character wants to go around with a shawl wrapped around his armor I will give him a minus to his intimidate skill. Like a -3 to -5 just because he looks silly.
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"The GM can always outlaw it" is the rule zero fallacy. Anything can be removed from the game. If it needs to be removed, that's the problem.
Nobody's talking about a shawl. Shirts are worn UNDER the armour. Where normal, non-protective clothing is supposed to go. That's why they get their own slot: armour is designed to be worn over a shirt.
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I get the point. Maybe Im not seeing how broken it is. Sure a extra move is a good benefit. Not that game breaking.
The "extra move" will almost always translate into a "full attack." It's under-priced at 1,000 GP -- but not broken. But the ability to do it for every encounter in the day is somewhere pretty close to broken.
I've been toying with a house rule for a decade that magic items need a full 24 hours to attune themselves to a user. There could be a "quick-attunement word" associated with some items (for those situations in which the characters have legitimate use for and need of an item almost immediately, or for passing around), but unlike the command word it would not be discoverable as easily as an identify spell.
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Archers suck (the joy out of the game), it's true. Better they were de-powered rather than ramp everything else up though...Melee needs those movement items ... archers are making a mockery of melee at the moment mid game.
I would have preferred a slightly reworked belt of battle with attunement though, it's less cheesy than swapping out shirts all the time (reworked to give move/standard attack or combat manoeuvre/full attack so it's not a cheaper metamagic rod of quickening for the casters).
Archers are so situational though. You get a few sharp corners or plenty of cover (such as in a forest or underground cavern) and their capability starts dwindling. Their per hit damage is so low compared to any other character that any change in terrain that forces them to move to take a shot or takes away their range advantage leaves them as pitiful characters only capable of dealing damage, and not very much any more. They're nearly as situational as medium-sized cavaliers.
There is a lot you can do to mitigate that of course (Precise Shot, Seeking properties, etc.) but given the amount of investment and focus required for them to be good at doing damage, they really should be, you know, good at doing damage. They require as much feat investment as a TWF, but a TWF who finds himself in an open field can whip out a bow and do only marginally less than the dedicated archer, and still have his swords to fall back on, while the inverse just isn't true.
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The easiest way to tell if there is power creep is if existing adventures still work. I am just beginning a kingmaker game and had to up the power of most of the encounters.
Many of the old games need serious steroids to get the NPCs and monsters to even give the players a pause. So there is definitely creep in the level of damage that the players can pump out. a 1st level human fighter can get cleave and great sword and be pumping out 2D6+8 at two enemies a turn. In kingmaker the enemies didn't even register they where slaughtered so quick. I would say the synchro summoner is dangerous but a wizard with the right arcane heritage and metamagic feat can be just as bad.
I would say characters are almost 50% more powerful. they hit twice the number of enemies, or more, with the right combo min maxed.
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The easiest way to tell if there is power creep is if existing adventures still work. I am just beginning a kingmaker game and had to up the power of most of the encounters.
Many of the old games need serious steroids to get the NPCs and monsters to even give the players a pause. So there is definitely creep in the level of damage that the players can pump out. a 1st level human fighter can get cleave and great sword and be pumping out 2D6+8 at two enemies a turn. In kingmaker the enemies didn't even register they where slaughtered so quick. I would say the synchro summoner is dangerous but a wizard with the right arcane heritage and metamagic feat can be just as bad.
I would say characters are almost 50% more powerful. they hit twice the number of enemies, or more, with the right combo min maxed.
Kingmaker is easy with a group of CRB only characters depending on the group. We went through it with a 5 man team consisting of an elf archer fighter, a human paladin, a dwarven cleric, a half-elf ranger, and a halfling bard all made on a 20 point buy using only the CRB and destroyed it. I was also GM for a group more recently consisting of a half-orc cavalier, a human oracle, an elf alchemist, and a gnome summoner who managed to get themselves wiped by the first group of bandits they encountered. Saying that characters are nearly 50% more powerful is a huge stretch, and I have yet to see any evidence to indicate such a huge gap in power. More recent Adventure Paths have just adjusted to account for a higher level of optimization, since AP's have traditionally been balanced to a 4 man group on a 15 point buy. That's a very low threshold.
Kingmaker was also released right after the new Pathfinder Core rules came out, and was built to accomodate new PF players and old 3.5 players as well. Any AP balanced to 3.5 core characters is going to be a cakewalk for a party of PF characters.It should also be noted that a cleaving character dealing 2d6+9 damage per hit is something you can do right out of the CRB with a level one human fighter, no splat books or anything other than the CRB needed. That's normal. Human fighter, greatsword, power attack and cleave, 18 STR. No creep at all, that's just a normal fighter doing what fighters do.
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a 1st level human fighter can get cleave and great sword and be pumping out 2D6+8 at two enemies a turn.
How is this power creep? It's CRB for a STR 18 human fighter with Power Attack and Cleave.
I think that two-handed fighting is too heavily favored in PFRPG, but that's a different issue. (And I'm not saying that melee combat is too heavily favored; just two-handers. They get the bigger dice, the 1.5 multiplier to Strength, and the extra Power Attack Damage. It's just too much compared to the other melee options.)
The easiest way to tell if there is power creep is if existing adventures still work. I am just beginning a kingmaker game and had to up the power of most of the encounters.
Many of the old games need serious steroids to get the NPCs and monsters to even give the players a pause. So there is definitely creep in the level of damage that the players can pump out. a 1st level human fighter can get cleave and great sword and be pumping out 2D6+8 at two enemies a turn. In kingmaker the enemies didn't even register they where slaughtered so quick. I would say the synchro summoner is dangerous but a wizard with the right arcane heritage and metamagic feat can be just as bad.
I would say characters are almost 50% more powerful. they hit twice the number of enemies, or more, with the right combo min maxed.
I'm not disputing you, but I'd like to know how many players are in the party and what kind of ability score allocation are you using? Those things have a very telling effect at low level.
I'm running Serpent Skull, and I have to adjust every encounter. Of course I've also got 8 players and a 20 point buy. Even trying to do simple multiplication of the targets usually doesn't wash because of force multiplication abilities present in the party. I generally have to re-tweak encounters from the ground up with class levels or templates. My players can pretty easily tell the difference between me changing numbers and re-writing. The latter usually results in a lot of carnage on the PC side.
Honestly very few of the characters at my table are optimized. One of the toughest is the fighter and he's mostly core rules (though he does use a falcata).
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I'm not disputing you, but I'd like to know how many players are in the party and what kind of ability score allocation are you using? Those things have a very telling effect at low level.I'm running Serpent Skull, and I have to adjust every encounter. Of course I've also got 8 players and a 20 point buy. Even trying to do simple multiplication of the targets usually doesn't wash because of force multiplication abilities present in the party. I generally have to re-tweak encounters from the ground up with class levels or templates. My players can pretty easily tell the difference between me changing numbers and re-writing. The latter usually results in a lot of carnage on the PC side.
Honestly very few of the characters at my table are optimized. One of the toughest is the fighter and he's mostly core rules (though he does use a falcata).
This is a pretty important point. Using AP's over time as a way to judge power creep is terrible, because AP's are balanced to be very winnable for a party of 4 non-optimized adventurers on a 15 point buy. If you have additional players, or you're rolling stats or using a 20 or 25 point buy, your "very winnable" campaign just turned into a game of whack-a-mole where your party is a twenty year-old with lightning sharp reflexes and the moles are everything else.
Send them at the 3.5 version of Xanesha from the Skinsaw Murders. That should give you a legitimate standard.
It's hard to believe that a Synthetist with a Quick Runner Shirt is in the same level of power than a Core Book only fighter. By any means
Also:
I get the point. Maybe Im not seeing how broken it is. Sure a extra move is a good benefit. Not that game breaking. As for extra shirts all a DM has to do is limit it to one shirt or only one shirt. Or the sack holding the shirts gets burnt by fire or stolen by a rogue. Not to mention my monsters are going to be trageting the guy who keep switching in and out of shirts.
Ssalarn wrote:
As a 1/day item the Quickrunners Shirt isn't bad, but it's so cheap that there's no reason not to have a pack full of them in various cuts and styles.
They are cheap yet a DM can always outlaw the item from the game. Not to mention if a melee character wants to go around with a shawl wrapped around his armor I will give him a minus to his intimidate skill. Like a -3 to -5 just because he looks silly.
That's the rule zero fallacy. It's akin to say that a first level spell that cast nuclear bombs isn't overpowered because you can outlaw it. The fact that you have to outlaw it is a *proof* of its imbalance, not the other way around.
It's hard to believe that a Synthetist with a Quick Runner Shirt is in the same level of power than a Core Book only fighter. By any means
It's hard to believe that a Synthesist with Pounce is in the same level of power as a CRB-only Fighter.
It's hard to believe that a Synthetist with a Quick Runner Shirt is in the same level of power than a Core Book only fighter. By any meansIt's hard to believe that a Synthesist with Pounce is in the same level of power as a CRB-only Fighter.
Yep, I was talking about a Shiva Build. But quadruped pounce will work as well.
What is a average extra '+' between an optimsed 15 pt and 20 or 25 pt character?
S.
Good question.
Some stat blocks for comparison(not dumping any stats):
20 point (human fighter):
str 18
dex 14
con 14
int 10
wis 10
chr 10
15 point human fighter
16
14
14
10
10
10
So we can see only a 1+ difference, but the former gets to do an 18 in the prime stat.
For a more stark comparison, let's try a monk since they are more MAD.
Monk 20
16
14
14
10
14
10
Monk 15 (gonna cave here and dump for comparison's sake)
14
14
14
10
14
8
This gives a net +2 difference.
Now that certainly doesn't look like such a big deal, but an 18 str vs. a 16 means a 2 handed weapon deals 2 more damage, which is particularly large at low level. An 18 in a prime casting stat results in a lot of benefit, such as more bonus spells over a larger level range, and the DCs of spells get pumped which is quite important at the margin (a 20 needed to save vs. 19-20 is twice as hard to get).
The difference may look small on paper, but in practice it tends to be pretty telling.
Plus if your main stat is dex, you also get better REF, better initiative, AC, stealth and acrobatics...
I think "power creep" is a nonsense concept that you have no justification to complain about.
RPG companies have two choices for sustainable business:
1) Create new (editions of) games entirely
2) Create new material for their extant games.
First, I'm not convinced that anything new is necessarily more powerful than it was before--it's a mix of powerful and so weak we don't even talk about it, just like before. Second, even if it was, there's only so much creative space horizontally--at some point you have to go vertical.
There is also some power creep in items. The Furious weapon property is almost a straight upgrade for a barbarian over +1.See, this is what I was talking about--this is not power creep. This is an example of an item that's good for a Barbarian that isn't in core. There are also lousy items in the same book, are there are not? Are there not good options in Core as well (Keen, Holy, Spell Storing, etc.)?
There are good options being printed. There were good options printed in Core. How is it power creep if good options exist in equal, albeit expanded proportion?
It seems that by the criteria most people are using (not just the fellow I quoted) is that nothing published after Core can be as good or better than Core. That's crazy talk--why would you buy any additional books if nothing could be as good or better than core?
For every Lead Blades, there's an Emblazoned Crest. More options are not power creep, even more good options.
The only power creep in RPGs I've ever personally witnessed was in 4e when, instead of issuing errata to fix old material that did not match the math they had intended, they simply created new feats with exactly identical, but better, functions. That's it.
Denial of power creep is horse manure. As a DM, if additions to the game mean I have to tweak my encounters upward from a long calibrated level of difficulty at a given level, I see power creep.
1. When new classes, races, feats, items, enchantments or other mechanical elements of the game are introduced through new content and some significant portion of the new content is demonstrably better than existing mechanical elements.
2. Only when the very most powerful elements in the game are superseded by new content. Increasing the power of existing elements that are not the most powerful is viewed as "improving balance".
3. Only when newly introduced content immediately becomes the default "must have" option for any character concept AND that newly introduced content "breaks" generally accepted encounter balance.
I am in camp 1. If new content comes out and makes martial classes obviously more powerful, but does not make them more powerful than caster classes, that is still "power creep".
"Power creep" in and of itself is not necessarily bad. The current rogue could use some power creep, for example.
I suppose any of the above definitions is defensible. I would say that any of them are problematical for GMs who have already adjusted their games to deal with existing imbalance issues. I would also say that as far as I am concerned, martial and caster imbalance is a FEATURE not a BUG. It beggars verisimilitude for me in the current game system with the sorts of cosmic reality altering god-like powers of spellcasters, for dudes who beat on things with sticks to be as powerful as casters. So I'm fine with that. And I don't always play casters. I don't play the game to be Superman, and I'm actually fine playing Batman in the Justice League. But I recognize that some players find it unfair if their character isn't able to shine as brightly as any other character.
In my opinion, using definition 1 above, PF has experienced significant and steady power creep. Entire classes have been superseded by new classes. Feats, items, enchantments and spells have been introduced that totally obsolete existing content.
Also in my opinion, using definition 2 above, I would say that there has been significant, but not as steady, power creep. This has primarily been in the area of feats, items and spells, since those are the areas that impact existing full casters.
But using definition 3 above, I would say that there has been low to moderate power creep. Maybe closer to "low". I have not had to make major adjustments to my game to deal with "game breaking" things in Pathfinder. I have not yet had to outright ban entire books, classes or builds.
Having said that, I still find it sometimes irritating to have to deal with the power creep in #1 and #2. Things like "bracers of the falcon" which absolutely obsolete existing long-time standard content that was perfectly fine already (and cost less too!) just sort of rub me the wrong way because it creates situations where I as a GM have to figure out whether to, and then how to, "fix" existing characters in the games to deal with the new stuff. It's a bookkeeping annoyance, but it's still an annoyance.
I can understand your point of view. You're protecting your livelyhood. As long as new rules material is being produced, better-than-core options are inevitable. But denial of a basic fact is a terrible defense, and not one likely to win you intelligent admirers.
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It is also ignoring the buisness model.
The rules aren't the primary revenue stream. The Adventure Paths and Modules are.
The margins are so much higher for the APs and Modules vs the hardcovers it is not even funny.
This is where creep can be a problem write for core as the power level, which if that isn't the case...now suddenly the APs aren't geared toward the rule set...
This was a major problem in 3.5
It is far less a problem in Pathfinder specifically because they don't need splatbooks to give "Moar power!" to make money. They just need new options you are going to want to run through new adventures that they are writing.
Still not a bad idea to do a major overhaul at some point, but it will need to stay compatible with the system that exists or risk breaking a revenue stream (remember when they transitioned from a 3.5 AP to a Pathfinder AP and only in house new the new rules...and that was largely compatible) and also losing all that back catalog revenue.
Still think it should be a goal, but the rules aren't the main driver of income at Paizo like they were/are at WOTC. That is why they embrace OGL so much. More access to the rules means more players means more people buying APs/modules/setting books means profit.
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The rules aren't the primary revenue stream. The Adventure Paths and Modules are.
The margins are so much higher for the APs and Modules vs the hardcovers it is not even funny.
Now this interests me. Do you have evidence for that (I'm not doubting you--just really intrigued)?
I've literally never purchased a module or AP for any RPG ever, in 20 years. I can tell my own stories, I don't need someone else's. In fact, if a book does not have new mechanics in it (expanded rules, new character resources, etc.), I have zero interest in it.
It is wild to me to think that more people would buy someone else's stories than their rules. Is it just because all of Pathfinder's rules are free online, so they have to rely on selling the stuff that isn't free?
I don't know, if there weren't new mechanics being released, I doubt I'd keep playing Pathfinder...