These came up during a PFS event, but don’t really have anything to do with the Society aspect.
1 - Giving orders. My sorcerer summons a celestial dog. I don’t have any way to speak with animals. I do know the celestial language.
Can I tell the dog to use its sent ability to track someone by speaking in celestial?
I did not think it was possible, but everyone else at the table including the GM said I could. (Dog rolled badly and didn't find the trail anyway.)
2 - Chase scene. The GM was using the chase scene cards. This is only the second time I have been involved with the chase scene rules. Last time it worked reasonably well. The fast, agile, skilled PC’s were catching up with the target. This time however, most of the cards had checks that very few of us had any chance to succeed.
The very first card was Handle Animal DC 10 or Acrobatics DC 25. The only one of us that had a single rank in handle animal was the monk (don’t know why) but he still had a better chance on the acrobatics role. We had a couple PC’s that had points in acrobatics, but not enough to offset their armor and still have a +5. So only one PC could get past the first card. The third was a strength or climb check. I think both were DC 25. Again we were stuck (one guy could make the strength check if he happened to roll a 20). The GM said it wasn’t by the rules, but we could take a full round to get past one card. The bad guy was going by 2 card (might have been 3) every round.
Are the chase scenes typically this impossible or were we doing something wrong?
1 - Giving orders. My sorcerer summons a celestial dog. I don’t have any way to speak with animals. I do know the celestial language.
Can I tell the dog to use its sent ability to track someone by speaking in celestial?
The Celestial template does not confer the ability to speak or understand celestial.
In order to get the dog to do anything besides attack your opponents to the best of its ability, you'll need a way to communicate with it. Since it doesn't understand language, you would need to use Handle Animal and, depending on what tricks your GM decides it knows, you may have to 'push' it to Track.
James Jacobs says you should be able to decide who it attacks, where it attacks from, and how it attacks, barring GM deciding otherwise. (He then clarifies that it's only his opinion on how he would run it, and may not be rules legal, pending JB addressing the issue. But it seems really reasonable to not need a handle check to make it attack the ogre instead of one of the goblins running around.)
Are the chase scenes typically this impossible or were we doing something wrong?
Chase scenes can be kind of wonky. The only one I remember actually being in the book gave the PCs the opportunity to not be wearing their armor and shields, which would certainly help in most of those checks.
I've seen the full-round automatic pass houserule before, and I think the chase mechanic desperately needs something like that.
The celestial language thing was a change from 3.5. The templates used to increase intelligence to 3, which granted them the ability to understand a language, so they learned Celestial. This isn't the case in PF anymore and to get it to do much, you need to use a Handle Animal check.
That wouldn't quite work as his character is a sorcerer.
It might also be a standard action to use each time, as the line
though each time you speak to animals, you must decide to communicate with either amphibians, birds, fish, mammals, or reptiles, and can only speak to and understand animals of that type
doesn't really make sense otherwise. Maybe I'm missing something though.
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I've been in one chase scene before, and I loved it, but I was playing a skill monkey at the time. The tower shield fighter in full plate with 1 skill and negatives to his INT and CHA hated it, and we lost the chase as a group because of him. Oh well. You can't win them all.
I like the mechanic, personally. It changes things up. It also encourages players to make PCs that are more diverse and able to handle more than just combat. There's a similar event in another scenario where you have to pilot a dog sled in a race. Nobody saw that one coming.
Well, it's a supernatural ability and those default to standard actions unless stated otherwise, which it does kind of imply with the speaking bit. Hence why I said it might be a standard action :)
But if it were just the free action, that's a really strange limitation to spend so many words on as you could just free action speak to one type of animal, and then another, and then a third. At no significant cost, which really clashes with the idea that you can only speak to one type at a time. Might be a good topic to research more...
It might also be a standard action to use each time
Supernatural Abilities (Su): "Using a supernatural ability is usually a standard action (unless defined otherwise by the ability's description)."
Feral Speech (Su): "You gain the ability to speak with and understand the response of any animal as if using speak with animals, though each time you speak to animals..."
I think "each time you speak to animals" is referring to using the ability which functions as speak with animals.
That would match up with the usage of the hex Feral Speech (Su).
See? More research helped.
I don't mind learning the elemental languages, though it will take me a few levels since I'm only getting 4 skill points each level and need to keep up some of my other skills. But not being able to talk to any of the animals kinda puts a cramp in some things. Is there a relatively inexpensive magic item that will let me speak with them? I suppose I could just get a wand of speak with animals and UMD it.
I do kinda like the way the chase scene worked out a couple months ago. It used a bunch of different skills that the group might have. Most of us (except the tank) had an at least halfway decent chance of getting my them with a couple of tries.
But this time, there was literally no chance to get by 3 or 4 out of 8 cards. Trained only skills or a natural 20 wouldn't have been high enough. Also I think the GM said even the guy we were chasing couldn't have made it past 2 of the cards if he hadn't started already past them. It wasn't a huge deal, just seemed wierd and I was wondering if that happened alot.
Your chase scene comment is a somewhat common complain in PFS, but that's more due to people ignoring the skills that help in chase scenes. Not being able to smash your way through the chase scene encounter is something a lot of people have issues with.
In what book are those chase rules? GMG?
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Your chase scene comment is a somewhat common complain in PFS, but that's more due to people ignoring the skills that help in chase scenes. Not being able to smash your way through the chase scene encounter is something a lot of people have issues with.
That and having an NPC that is tailored for the chase scene.
Thank you Cheapy.
Your chase scene comment is a somewhat common complain in PFS, but that's more due to people ignoring the skills that help in chase scenes. Not being able to smash your way through the chase scene encounter is something a lot of people have issues with.
Well, I sorta agree. But in or out of PFS I've only seen rangers and druids take handle animal. I might take a rank since I seem to be summoning alot. But that is unusual. A 25 strength check at level 4 seems a bit harsh. The only ones I've seen put much into acrobatics is combat rogue/ninja to try and get in position. Even then it might take them a few tries to hit 25. I guess it was the combinations and the high DC's.
The GM seemed quite disappointed that we weren't even trying to roll for them. But we kept saying even if I roll a 20 that doesn't get me past it.Afterward he mentioned that we could have used 'aid another' to give some bonuses. But even then, so ok if we all aided 1 guy to get past the card then he is stuck by himself on the next one. Besides he said we all had to get through individually so we didn't think we could use aid another.
The only other chase scene I've been in (with some of the same PC's), the DC's were alot lower. So everyone had I think at least a 1 in 4 chance to get past any card rather than zero chance.
Oh well, like I said. No big deal.