The player who complains that "throws are cheap" will never get better at the game.
"better at the game" = "numerically optimized" summarizes pretty neatly the difference in our outlooks, I think.
I would say that generally speaking a person who is more knowledgeable about something will be "better" at it then someone who is less knowledgeable about it. In this case, knowledge translates to more effective builds. Anyone who complains that someone has a more effective build then they do are not the sort of people one should want to play with. Especially since there are many resources available to improve one's knowledge about the game, such as the wonderful guides and helpful people on this forum.
Honestly, the thing that really gets me is you don't have to have an observer to use a masterpiece.
So what happens if you use it, replacing a knowledge skill, when there is no one else around? Does it matter if your bluff check is not heard by anyone?
What happens when you try to make that knowledge noble check in the middle of the woods? "If a bard in the woods uses a masterpiece and no one is around to hear it, does it automatically fail?"
It seems to me the number one problem thematically is the using your grace part. But what happens if no one is around to observe your grace? Does your graceful movement have to be observed to take effect? If so, why doesn't this ability specify that?
*tongue-in-cheek* It doesn't specify that because while it does make you better at graceful movements they have nothing to with the fact that it also lets you use Bluff in place of INT based skills. *tongue-in-cheek*
Strictly a matter of opinion, of course, but I don't want to be playing a game where, if someone says: "I'd like to play a high knowledge character", people reply: "Well, obviously you should play a Bard, and take Pageant of the Peacock".
The fewer "best" options there are, the more limiting the game becomes.
It seems to me the number one problem thematically is the using your grace part. But what happens if no one is around to observe your grace? Does your graceful movement have to be observed to take effect? If so, why doesn't this ability specify that?
Thomas, if you're convinced of the using bluff for all int checks interpretation, give up trying to make sense of it. Even the proponents of that interpretation admit there is no thematical sense to it. "It's magic. Sexy magic".
Strictly a matter of opinion, of course, but I don't want to be playing a game where, if someone says: "I'd like to play a high knowledge character", people reply: "Well, obviously you should play a Bard, and take Pageant of the Peacock".
The fewer "best" options there are, the more limiting the game becomes.
There will always be a best option. Always. For anything you want to do, something will be the best at it. That's just how the game and world in general works.
There will always be a best option. Always. For anything you want to do, something will be the best at it. That's just how the game and world in general works.
You enjoy a very different game than me, Anzyr, but I think we already knew that.
I'll grant that's not a bad story, given what you're working with. Much better than just saying "Sexy magic", anyway.
Actually. I believe I did make some sense of it (although it was admittedly me putting flavor to mechanics, rather than based off of the power alone). The flavor, in my opinion, is that the masterpiece is a supernatural form of extreme method acting. You take on the aura of someone more refined and knowledgeable, and supernaturally get into their mindset, making your bluff and disguises easier, and making you more knowledgeable (in my reading once per use) as you get into the head of someone of greater station/refinement/etc.
That's sort of how I see it. The Bard is channelling their muse who is some form of spiritual, almost omniscient entity.
|
Hilarious enough, I was under the impression that this ability did quite a bit less, until two of my DMs convinced me otherwise.
This may sound odd to some, but just about every DM I have played with, actually likes it when a player makes a Knowledge check.
I am still trying to find the int-based skill that everyone finds so "abusable", that it must be stopped.
It is not that the ability is abusable for the difficulty of the check you can make, it is for:
- "Boy, you have actually spent skill point for knowledge checks? what a waste. This is how it is done." Roll bluff. That is decidedly annoying for any character that has spend skill point in knowledge checks.- the sheer quantity of skill point you save with this ability. So it is not the "abuse" you get when you use it, it is the advantage you get during character development.
- the fact that bards that trade away Bardic Knowledge essentially get it back with this masterpiece.
If it was a wizard spell that cost little more than a cantrip and allow him to do a intelligence based skill check on using his caster level + 7 point of bonuses (the +4 from PotP and the class bonus on bluff) and intelligence people would be up in arms: "The wizard is stealing the other classes abilities".
|
|
The player who complains that "throws are cheap" will never get better at the game. If that fact that there is someone who can make a character that does what their character does only better bothers them, they can always seek advice from more experienced players to improve their builds. Complaining about someone else having a better build though is the height of a badwrongfun attitude that should be stomped out as quickly as possible for the benefit of the game.He's not going to be upset if there's another character that can help make sure that happens.I have experience with players that shows that this is not the case. Maybe you wouldn't feel that way, but that doesn't mean others don't (and they do).
I detail it in the other thread, if you care. The argument about what players should or should not feel (and what an odd thing to have opinions about. Other people and what they should feel?) is hashed out in detail there. Not going to repeat it here.
Careful, though; the thread makes blackbloodtroll ill, so it may be contagious. Who can say?
I would question the "better build" argument. It is simply a "gift from a game designer". You can't do nothing to get better at intelligence skill checks than the bard with PotP without expending a quantity of resources so large that it become impractical.
|
It's not the fact that any one knowledge skill is game breaking. It's the fact that the way some people are interpreting this, it gives you 15-40 skill points for every one you spend, and *that* is game breakingly unbalanced.
Frankly, if you want your players to get all the backstory, and having one player have unlimited, knowledge, craft, spellcraft, and appraise, why not just get rid of those skills, and let everyone auto succeed at them.
If on the other hand high knowledge skills give you extra information, which rewards players who put points into that skill, and this makes one player just auto succeed at everything, that *is* very unbalanced.
DrakeRoberts, Sorry our dicussion got derailled. I had some useful thoughts on it, and I will get back to them when I have time to sit down and work them out in a constructive fashion. I think you raised some really good points, and if a player showed up to my game with PotP and thought it worked the way you laid out, I would not be unhappy with it. (Though I really feel the knowledge granted needs to be in some way related to passing yourself off as more refined, noble, educated etc.)
|
|
Torbyne. Sure they can.
take the trait clever words (bluff)
while you are at it, take pragmatic activator.
but all your points into wallpaper
at 5th level, dip one level of bard. take PotP masterpiece as your feat.
burn a round of perform at the start of a fight, and use PotP (Int + skill points + 4 + (whatever else) for all you knowledge checks, spellcraft checks, concentration checks (remember, those are int checks too....) etc.)
Now, it is going to be a lot weaker, because you won't have a whole lot of rounds of performance...
Reading through this thread, I feel like some people really have concerns on the power level of this ability clouding their idea of what the "correct interpretation" of the ability is. Would people be making such a big deal out of this if it only allowed you to substitute bluff for knowledge: history or nobility? I doubt it.
Also, I think it's worth noting that Paizo does use different wording to accomplish the same effect. In another thread, a poster pointed out the number of ways Paizo has labeled new additions to the monk bonus feat list. Another point is that, if we assume the interpretation of "make a bluff check, get the results of an intelligence check,", this wording is actually far clearer than the bard's versatile performance ability. It's "make a bluff check instead of an int-based check," not "substitute your ranks in perform and things like skill focus but add circumstantial modifiers from the skill you're actually using, but not masterwork tools and similar bonuses from perform." (See the links from James Jacobs on Versatile Performance earlier in the thread.)
|
|
My problem isn't with a power working like this. It's with the fact that I don't see support for those mechanics in the power:...my example
It was more that I was taking the mechanics of the power as I see them:
(Abreviated to include just the parts relevant to this part of the power)
(SU) you can convince others of your breeding, eloquence, and refinement ... attempt a Bluff check in place of an Intelligence check or Intelligence-based skill check.
and working from there to "how would replacing an Inteligence test with a bluff check convince others of your breeding, eloquence, and refinement." Really I feel like what it should really do is make it so that people just don't notice that you don't know things you should know. So that rather than having to come up with lies to explain gaps in your knowledge (with every added lie making the next lie less plausible,) people just don't notice.
But I agree with you, I just can't see how to get to there without adding way to many mechanics to the thing.
So I think I am just going with your interpretation, until I can think up something better or until we get a clarification, with the following caveats (in bold):
1) You are adjusting your body language (this is why we require Dance or Act)
--1a) You must have an audience you are trying to impress with your Pageant (It can be small, but you have to be legitimately trying to impress them.)2) The adjustment in body language makes you seem 'better' than you are (as defined by breeding/eloquence/refinement)
3) This sense of refinement (etc.) gives you a +4 circumstance bonus to Bluff, as people are more likely to believe you (as refined/eloquent/well-bred types are less likely to lie... depending on who you ask, at least)
3) This sense of refinement (etc.) gives you a +4 circumstance bonus to Bluff checks to appear more than you are. While the base power seems to restrict this to breeding or refinement, I would allow you to use it for any claim of credentials or rank.4) It likewise gives you a +4 circumstance bonus to disguise to pose as someone of higher station (after all, you seem more refined/eloquent/well-bred than someone of your actual station)
5) Finally, ONCE during this charade, the supernatural nature of this bluffing and posturing lets you use Bluff in place of an Intelligence or Intelligence-based skill check. (This is basically magical method acting... you're channeling the persona of someone who would know, and the supernatural elements of the ability make it so)
--5a) the successful result of this skill check must be something you could use to impress your audience, or it must be a check where failing it would expose you as a fraud.Note that in my interpretation, the knowledge/information gained, or other results of the int-based check are Real, this is what makes it supernatural.
That's a lot easier to deal with than the Oracle with a +12 initiative and a DC 20 Color Spray that can affect 10 HD creatures as if they had 4HD.Damn, are you inside my iPad, looking at my HeroLab portfolios of my new characters or something?
Wait, no. That must have been a generalization. You didn't say anything about it being a persistent heightened color spray requiring two DC 20 will saves and cast out of a 4th level slot.
-Undead (and various others) are immune to it so you can go through the majority of a scenario with your primary weapon being worthless. You end up either having to know the general monsters that you're going to face in a scenario, or risk unpleasant surprises. This is partially mitigated by careful selection of your remaining spells known, but all of your feats remain committed to one spell.
-Much more importantly, this build is the ultimate expression of Save or Die. You either one-shot or trivialize an encounter, or you do nothing that round. It's something of a thrill when it works, but it's a huge bummer when it doesn't. Especially if you've won initiative and rushed to within 15 feet of an enemy grouping.
-Most importantly, keep in mind that we play this game with friends, and this particular character build is a great way to upset your friends. I managed to single-handedly harsh the vibe of an entire table by one-shotting a boss during a very early adventure with this character build. I watched a player's face go from happy/excited to dissappointed, and the GM for that table later told me that it was the worst GMing experience she'd had for a long time after. We ended up repeating the fight without with the color spray.
The above is the most vivid example in my memory, but it's far from the only one. I've upset three different GMs with this character build, and I've had to learn to be VERY careful with how and when I use it. Frankly, it's been a lot more trouble than its worth. It's the only character that I regret creating.
All of which is to say... it's hard not to spotlight hog with that build. Which is why Akerlof brought it up, I'm sure.
I don't complain about it mainly because their entire build is devoted to dealing damage, as opposed to it being a small cost ability they take to one-shot bosses.
A barbarian's entire build is built around doing damage. He doesn't really do anything else.
If the bard's entire build were devoted to doing this absurd skill substitution thing so that he couldn't really do anything else, I wouldn't complain about it either.
Like the Slumber Hex?
Don't get me wrong, I'm not a fan of the Slumber Hex. It's just not a situation where I see any interpretation ambiguity to argue about. I can only throw in my opinion to see it removed from additional resources for PFS. There's not really a debate to be had.
I'm not following. I suspect biting sarcasm, but am always leery of reading tone into textual posts on the internet.