Design Manager
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Yeah it's small but if he can stand next to the squishies, an option generally not available to a melee warder, it'll be well used.
DING DING DING!!!!!!!!!!!
There it is.
This may wax a bit narcissistic but bear with me here:
When I first saw the original (no offense Chris) roughly constructed Archer Lord, it hit me: Here is the potential for a class that does something no other class does well in the entire system: actually tank. Aegis is actually a fairly mediocre ability when you think about it, because the Warder is up in melee and normally the people who need the benefit of the Aegis, the casters, aren't joining you up in the mix. But low and behold, the Archer Lord shows up and suddenly he can post himself right next to the squishies, wherever they may be, and still contribute to combat while protecting them. If the Rogue gets in a little trouble, the Archer Lord can start peppering whatever is beating on him, Marking it and giving the Rogue a better chance, and/or he can Mark the ranged enemies, making it nearly impossible for them to target the casters and focusing their attacks on him. Then bring in my ability
My other proposed ability
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Not to derail the Archer Lord conversation but I HATE the name "Mithral Rook's Stance." It's the only instance of chess terminology and it's out of place. Can we change rook to tower or rampart or something? Anything would do. You'd have to call it Mithral Poop Stance for it to be more out of place in the discipline.
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Not to derail the Archer Lord conversation but I HATE the name "Mithral Rook's Stance." It's the only instance of chess terminology and it's out of place. Can we change rook to tower or rampart or something? Anything would do. You'd have to call it Mithral Poop Stance for it to be more out of place in the discipline.
Either that, or introduce more chess analogy names :)
Not to derail the Archer Lord conversation but I HATE the name "Mithral Rook's Stance."
It's not the bird?
...Were you aware that the chess piece is named after the defensive towers and ramparts of a castle?
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...Were you aware that the chess piece is named after the defensive towers and ramparts of a castle?
Actually, the word rook, when used in a chess context, was derived from the Persian word rukh, meaning chariot. When Chess was imported to Italy, the word was confused with the Italian word rocca meaning fortress, and then the misuse spread from there.
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Updated warder again.
Put the White Steppe archers back amongst other small fixes with a few maneuvers.
-X
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Design Manager
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Updated warder again.
Put the White Steppe archers back amongst other small fixes with a few maneuvers.
-X
Liking that Archer Lord! Awfully familiar looking fellow.....
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Does anyone know what to do about a flying creature knocked prone by a maneuver? I can't find anything.
Chris, since status effects are a big part of the maneuver system, it might be useful to put a page in the product that deals with corner cases like this. Flying while dazed or stunned is also a question. Knocking an ooze prone is also kind of odd and maybe impossible?
Does anyone know what to do about a flying creature knocked prone by a maneuver? I can't find anything.
At least in my own games, if something strikes a flying creature prone in a manner that they're not immune to (such as trip) I've always just had them fall. If their initiative comes up before they hit the ground they can attempt Fly checks to stay in the air, if not or if they fail they take the appropriate falling damage and are prone on the ground.
How far do you fall in a turn?
500 feet (note the note about casting while falling).
Does anyone know what to do about a flying creature knocked prone by a maneuver? I can't find anything.
Chris, since status effects are a big part of the maneuver system, it might be useful to put a page in the product that deals with corner cases like this. Flying while dazed or stunned is also a question. Knocking an ooze prone is also kind of odd and maybe impossible?
You can't knock a flying creature prone. There's no call out for it in the official rules, so it means you knock them towards the ground. I suppose if they're close they'd hit, take a little falling damage, but I think a simple Fly check would regain their ability to continue flying.
Same goes for other statuses. Honestly, I can't make a call out to fix all the rules that Pathfinder neglected; I'm not here to fix Pathfinder, just make a new book, ya know? :(
-X
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They don't have to be official but a page that says, "There are holes in the rules that are going to affect your table if you use this system, feel free to use whatever houserules you want but here's what we suggest if you don't know what to do..." would be great. I know we don't have rules at my table for any of those things that I mentioned above. I'd rather have someone who took some time thinking about these issues to offer me a suggestion than nothing.
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For myself, I've always just had them suffer the effects of the Prone condition - the modifications to armor class, the need to spend a move action to get back up that provokes an AoO, the works. Fluff it how you need to - they got tangled up in themselves, the strike threw a wing joint out of its socket, whatever.
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For myself, I've always just had them suffer the effects of the Prone condition - the modifications to armor class, the need to spend a move action to get back up that provokes an AoO, the works. Fluff it how you need to - they got tangled up in themselves, the strike threw a wing joint out of its socket, whatever.
In Alluria Publishing's Cerulean Seas setting, where all combat takes place underwater, they replaced the Prone condition with the Disoriented condition, which had basically exactly the same penalties and effects as Prone and took the same action to correct. It was literally just Prone with different fluff. That may be the best way to mitigate it with flying creatures if you don't want to accept that they're basically just immune to the condition.
For myself, I've always just had them suffer the effects of the Prone condition - the modifications to armor class, the need to spend a move action to get back up that provokes an AoO, the works. Fluff it how you need to - they got tangled up in themselves, the strike threw a wing joint out of its socket, whatever.In Alluria Publishing's Cerulean Seas setting, where all combat takes place underwater, they replaced the Prone condition with the Disoriented condition, which had basically exactly the same penalties and effects as Prone and took the same action to correct. It was literally just Prone with different fluff. That may be the best way to mitigate it with flying creatures if you don't want to accept that they're basically just immune to the condition.
Stolen and implemented.
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Seems at this point, you may as well make Ssalarn the co-designer. He's been pretty helpful.
One thing we ALWAYS do, is have everyone who feels they contributed anything in the alpha/beta stages, send over their names and we include them in the book with a specific thankyou for helping with design and playtesting.
Because you guys deserve to be in there, every one of you.
That's really generous of you guys =)
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Design Manager
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Seems at this point, you may as well make Ssalarn the co-designer. He's been pretty helpful.One thing we ALWAYS do, is have everyone who feels they contributed anything in the alpha/beta stages, send over their names and we include them in the book with a specific thankyou for helping with design and playtesting.
Because you guys deserve to be in there, every one of you.
Wow, thanks! You guys are pretty awesome, you know that?
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Seems at this point, you may as well make Ssalarn the co-designer. He's been pretty helpful.One thing we ALWAYS do, is have everyone who feels they contributed anything in the alpha/beta stages, send over their names and we include them in the book with a specific thankyou for helping with design and playtesting.
Because you guys deserve to be in there, every one of you.
Fact, if I can have my way, I have a gallery of names that I'd like to include to thank. Ssalarn, Orthos, and Yuengling definitely are on that list! You guys have been A+!
-X
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Wow, thanks! You guys are pretty awesome, you know that?Seems at this point, you may as well make Ssalarn the co-designer. He's been pretty helpful.One thing we ALWAYS do, is have everyone who feels they contributed anything in the alpha/beta stages, send over their names and we include them in the book with a specific thankyou for helping with design and playtesting.
Because you guys deserve to be in there, every one of you.
We honor those who are worthy of honoring - which is all of you guys who help out! We're thankful for having such awesome fans willing to partake in this playtest. :)
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The thank you will be great but its much more exciting when my critiques and my ideas like Shared Prowess get used. Super satisfying.
The amount of interaction with the design team is unparalleled in my experience and I think this is going to be a great product.
Also I did the level 15 Warder test today. I'll have a post about it later.
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Warder playtest! Chris, you're going to have to wait until Monday because it's on my work computer.
I made a couple changes. I found my original build kind of bland so I went with unarmed instead of a cestus and Dragon style feats.
Apparently you get a +2 bonus to save DC's when using a weappon from the disciplines weapon group. Only found that out recently. This was the first time I used it and guess what? Almost no one failed their saves. Super sad times. I can see why one might make room in their build for Discipline Focus.
ALSO, I screwed up bad, ya'll. See there are two cave giants on d20pfsrd. I've been using one that's a CR6 when I should have used the one that's a CR9. I'm going to try to find time to redo the fight for the other classes. But it's a much harder fight (Tome of Horror monsters don't f**k around) and the Warder had a tough time and if I didn't mention it now it might seem like he was crappy. He isn't.
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The Dragon fight went fine. I did as suggested and just applied the prone penalties and let them be called whatever. It's a good solution.
The Blackscale Sorcerers predictably murdered the hell out of the Warder. Even Burnished Shield and Extended Defense won't save a non-caster from that fight.
The Gongorinan and Cave Giants exposed the Warder's biggest weakness outside of crazy magics and that's attacks that don't target AC. ToH Cave Giants have trample and trample hurts real bad. Outside of trample nobody in the encounter could hit him without rolling a 20 which only happened once. He still almost died. Like 14hp or something around there.
The Druid died in two hits and his tree wasn't far behind.
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PLEASE, change Defensive Pallisade Stance so that I can't move and readopt it. I did it repeatedly. The way it's written does not prevent you from moving while using it, only from using your swift action.
Meteoric Throw still uses the same kind of grapple language that Iron Monger's Throw used to have. For the purposes of the test I changed it so it worked like Iron Monger's and did CMB +4.
Everything else worked out well.
are not most stances a swift action to activate? I was under the impression that swift action activation was fairly standard for that kind of thing.
*goes to check the srd*
Yeah, style feats normally cost a swift and there's a feat to make it a free action.
Even stalwart defenders stance is a swift.
Eating up your swift all the time is a pretty big deal, though - it means no boosts, for example. It means you can't use specific kinds of items. If there's initiating gishes down the road it means they can't use quickened spells (or indeed just some spells straight up). Admittedly a swift action isn't as valuable in Pathfinder (yet) as it was in 3.5 but it's still pretty expensive.
The Gongorinan and Cave Giants exposed the Warder's biggest weakness outside of crazy magics and that's attacks that don't target AC. ToH Cave Giants have trample and trample hurts real bad. Outside of trample nobody in the encounter could hit him without rolling a 20 which only happened once. He still almost died. Like 14hp or something around there.
Emphasis mine - this is sadly a problem with Melee in General. I dunno if plans are in the works to fix this or not (certainly I tried to give the Knights of the Fractured Prism nice things but I somehow don't think they're currently relevant) but at the barest minimum Chris and I are both aware that this is a problem for Everyone But Casters. Unfortunately it's not a simple problem to solve.
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Honestly, I'm a little okay with warders having a weakness to some attacks that don't target AC, because that also creates a need for other classes and the assistance they can provide. Cooperation is a good thing to foster.
-X
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Honestly, I'm a little okay with warders having a weakness to some attacks that don't target AC, because that also creates a need for other classes and the assistance they can provide. Cooperation is a good thing to foster.
-X
SOOOOOOooooooo much this.
I love the raw data that Yuengling's arena tests provide, but as we've discussed before, they miss a pretty critical portion of the game: Teamwork. I am really, really about classes and class features that promote team play, and that's something that currently all three of Chris' classes, Stalker, Warlord, and Warder, do extremely well. You can (and I have) make a party with one each of those three classes and then drop in any other class or two to cover offensive and defensive casting, and have an awesome group.
In fact, the Warlord, as I've talked about previously, is actually 3 or 4 times better when you don't min/max and focus on individual damage and instead build him to be a for real party leader with a buffing and action economy improvement focus. Any class that actually promotes teamwork over individual strength is awesome in my book, and it was a major principle in the suggestions and mechanics I proposed to Chris for the Archer Lord.
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We really do need a Cavalier/Warlord PrC that enhances Tactician and Golden Lion maneuvers in particular. :)
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We really do need a Cavalier/Warlord PrC that enhances Tactician and Golden Lion maneuvers in particular. :)
Do you want a Warlord/Cavalier multiclass PrC, or something that would allow a Cavalier to shift into becoming an Initiator? There is a lot of overlap between the Warlord and Cavalier, and the Warlord's Warleader is essentially the same mechanic but arguably better than Tactician.
I think more of a "Prideleader Knight" prestige class or something that advanced Tactician and gave Cavaliers access/progression to the Golden Lion discipline would be a better way to go, and would make it easier for players in active games to introduce the material without re-building their characters.
A PrC that gave and/or advanced Tactician and gave Initiator levels geared, towards Cavaliers but accessible to other classes like the Fighter, would be even better.
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Stormhierta,
Something like the following would be great:
Requirements
BAB +5
Skills: Diplomacy 4 ranks
Special- Must be initiated by a current Member of the Prideleader Knights
Good BAB progression, Good Fort and Will, Poor Ref
Level 1- Gain access to 2 maneuvers from the Golden Lion Discipline, Prideleader Knight levels are full Initiator levels for this discipline. Gain the Tactician ability as a cavalier. If you already have the Tactician ability from levels in Cavalier or another source, instead gain an additional Teamwork feat useable with this ability and count your Prideleader Knight levels as Cavalier levels for determining the effects and duration of the Tactician ability.
In proceeding levels gain extra maneuvers at even numbered levels, a Stance at levels 3 and 6, and additional maneuvers readied at 5 and 10. and then gain either Greater/Master Tactician, or a unique ability allowing you to activate Tactician as part of the same action used to adopt a stance.
Something like that would be great.
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Ssalarn, I think you are being too vague. You are not giving them a good enough feel for what it is you need. Just sayin' and just kidding. ;-)
I wish I had time to put the test time into this like you and YD, but I really appreciate seeing other people's thoughts and interpretations.
Kudos, you all deserve mention when the book comes out. I'll look for your names on my copy.
X, it looks like this is going to rock for those that give it a chance. Looking forward to it.
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A cavalier PrC Called the pride leader is so perfect a theme that it would be a crime NOT to do it!
Trogdar has spoken!
:P
I do conceptually like the idea of PrC or an archetype called a Pride Leader Knight. You'll forgive me I hope if I borrow the name, it's dang good. I think it might be a better archetype for adding maneuvers to cavalier though, personally. Simple is often best.
-X
Smart opponents murder mounts because they're less hardy than their riders and they offer advantages to the rider. Whenever I fight mounted foes as a player, I -murder- the mount in a fast hurry.
-X
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I do conceptually like the idea of PrC or an archetype called a Pride Leader Knight. You'll forgive me I hope if I borrow the name, it's dang good. I think it might be a better archetype for adding maneuvers to cavalier though, personally. Simple is often best.
-X
Chris, you officially have my permission to use the Pride Leader Knight name/idea in whatever manner you see fit. I think it would be really cool if it progressed Tactician, but I know that PrCs are used rarely enough that typically you want to make them as accessible as possible, which was why I suggested a PrC that either advanced or gave the ability and allowed a character to transition into Initiator levels.
Another thing you could look at doing, is take a peek at the Brother of the Seal archetype from Paths of Prestige. They've got a little packet "Unarmed Combat" ability that essentially says the PrC levels count as monk levels for progressing certain abilities. Something similar called like "Knightly Valor" that progresses a Cavalier's Challenge, Tactician, and Mount abilities would be good. Then you make the PrC kind of stand alone as far as pre-reqs, so other classes could take it, but Cavaliers will obviously be the target audience and get the most benefit.
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Also, on the subject of making the Pride Leader Knight a reality, am I the only person who feels like the name pretty much demands that the character get a Big Cat animal companion he can ride as a mount built into the class?
I'm just saying, it seems almost mandatory.
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So, suddenly I found myself wondering if there was any practical way to execute a situation where the Big Cat mount has access to some Golden Lion maneuvers :P
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Any second now the Pride Leader Knight in my head is going to switch from breastplate and lance to loincloth and broadsword and call out "By the power of Grayskull!"
Heh.
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For Eternia!!!
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Ehhh.... I don't think going that far is necessary. Maybe though. Trade out mount for a big ol' kitty. I dunno, too many He-Man jokes is exactly right though.
-X
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Ehhh.... I don't think going that far is necessary. Maybe though. Trade out mount for a big ol' kitty. I dunno, too many He-Man jokes is exactly right though.
-X
Yeah, go ahead and don't seriously consider anything that came after the Knightly Valor suggestion. I was having a Saturday morning cartoons moment.
Are there even Saturday morning cartoons anymore?
Question to all: What do you think of the Battle Prowess ability in Warlord?
Small static bonuses are generally the hallmark of the fighter class, so it may be a good idea to remove the ability and another idea was suggested to me by Knives that would be more 'maneuver' based. Something like how Warleader grants the ability to share teamwork feats, Battle Prowess would then share stuff like counters and boosts known by the warlord. How do people feel about that?
Also, I'm trying to get the other two classes into final alphas, I'll be posting updates to them soon to move them in that direction. I'll let ya know when those are up (of course).
-X
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Question to all: What do you think of the Battle Prowess ability in Warlord?
Small static bonuses are generally the hallmark of the fighter class, so it may be a good idea to remove the ability and another idea was suggested to me by Knives that would be more 'maneuver' based. Something like how Warleader grants the ability to share teamwork feats, Battle Prowess would then share stuff like counters and boosts known by the warlord. How do people feel about that?
Also, I'm trying to get the other two classes into final alphas, I'll be posting updates to them soon to move them in that direction. I'll let ya know when those are up (of course).
-X
Conceptually, I think it's a cool idea. Mechanically, I think it could be really troublesome. Are you thinking of the Warlord's allies getting like their own small pool of Maneuvers that the Warlord knows that they can access, or direct access to his maneuvers somehow, or...?
I remember 4E had/has a class that's healing ability was like an aura, and other characters could spend their actions to access your healing, and generally it was super obnoxious to have other characters able to dip directly into your resources. I'm about team play in a big way, but people need to be able to directly control how they participate in the team.
If you have to "grant" the ability to an ally, that has its own issues related to how to balance it within the action economy of a class that already uses pretty much all of its actions almost every round, and it starts to lose some thematic sense. The Warlord just talked me through executing an immediate action counter, but I'll never be able to do it again unless he's around? It's just a little.... weird.
Could you elaborate a bit on how you envision this mechanic working?
As far as Battle Prowess specifically goes, it isn't as good as Weapon Training, and it helps shore up a class that's probably going to be a bit more on the MAD side for a martial class, so I haven't had any issues with it, mechanically or thematically.