You could design an adventure that didn't require magic or strange supernatural powers to win the day. It would definitely be a narrow scope for encounter design. Pathfinder is a very fluid game with lots of options to accomplish what you want.
Agh
I'm not sure if the build works out but here's a rough estimate of a polymorphing focused sorcerer (core only)
Form of the dragon 3
Stats
Str 42
Dex 16
Con 28
Int 16
Wis 16
Cha 22
Saves: Fort 20, Ref 14, Will 20
AC: 36(8+8armor+8nat+5def+3dex+4shield)
Health: 303 (4+9+1+1)*20+3
Attack
+31/2d8+29; +31,+31/2d6+21; +26,+26/1d8+13; +26/2d6+29
Power Attack (-3)
+28/2d8+38; +28,+28/2d6+27; +23,+23/1d8+16; +23/2d6+38
Curiously the most underrepresented class in our games is the fighter (and the rogue). Most in our group would rather play paladin, ranger, barbarian or Inquisitor over a fighter, they just seem to have more.I don't think that's curious at all--it seems pretty typical, actually.
Maybe my problem is all my own fault. I want to be a non-magical character (or at least one that doesn't use Vancian magic, ugh). I'd rather have mundane stuff, like superior willpower, human ingenuity, and good old-fashioned moxie win the day over weird supernatural powers. But you can't do that in Pathfinder or 3rd edition D&D. You need magic to beat magic. I hate that. I guess I wish Iron Heroes was the default. Or that more people played other RPGs.
** spoiler omitted **...
Mplindustries, I understand where you are coming from. Pathfinder offers a lot of different playstyles, and that effectively determines what kind of classes are useful and which not.
One of my previous DMs apparently had a similar attitude and experience like you. He came from 2nd edition, and though he had played 3rd quite a while he never lost the idea that spellcasters are always superior.
So when we started an epic game he almost begged me to use tome of battle or some prestige class when I wanted to play a pure 20th+ level TWF fighter. I objected, but built my fighter for a) endurance and b) crits. I had 330hp at level 20 plus 8 DR (some epic feats were allowed).
Now I won't go into details, but just offer a few defining scenes:
1. After eating 150hp damage in one attack he looked expectantly and couldn't believe it when I said "so what? I still got 180". Next turn the cleric just healed it away.
2. Because he thought that spellcasters were the only thing that mattered all his creatures (he considered himself to be a hard DM where every session someone should die) were magic resistant, had DR, energy resistances etc. He also insisted on playing with critical hit decks. I just went for pure damage, brought down 8 attacks per round, critted at least twice each round and simply beat everything to a bloody pulp. I almost killed an actual god.
None of that would have been possible without the support of the rest of the group, of course. Particularly the cleric (healing) and the druid (summoned elementals etc. to grapple and hinder opponents) helped.
In the end though he did not know how to challenge me anymore without potentially killing the group.
After that experience he has become much more open to idea that martials, particularly the boring fighter, can be quite a power house.
Every time I read a story like that I wonder if the caster player really knows what to do.
I mean, your cleric is just healing? What?
They absolutely know what to do, very experienced players. But if you have a practically magic-immune opponent (golemlike) that emits as a free action each round a screech that requires a DC 35 Fort. save or die in a 30 ft radius, then it is quite an acceptable tactic IMO to just keep the martial standing that is beating the crap out of it and keeping distance yourself.
Even the elemental had no chance due to DR and its attack bonus - combat maneuvers and flanking was the only thing it could do, though it was an elder elemental.
They absolutely know what to do, very experienced players.You could miracle for a reverse gravity, if you really wanted.
Miracle is a pretty great spell, it seems like all your 9th slots should be miracle, ha
You overlooked that I stated that the thing was immune to magic, right? ;-)
Furthermore, in this scenario
1. his deity was dead
2. miracle etc. was specifically ruled out
3. we were thrown into this fight with only 1 minute prep time - so the left open spell slots could not be filled
4. we had no option not to immediately fight this thing - we had to stop it there or the world would alreay be dead.
The opponent was like this
1. DR 15/-
2. Immune to magic
3. Resistance 30 against all elements
4. 1000 hp
5. AC 50
6. flight, magical save-or-die abilities at will (dispelling silence spells etc. automatically), permanent save-less dimensional anchors centered on it etc.
So this was a pretty bad situation. According to the DM we were supposed to discover its weakness somehow, but we never managed. The creature was alien to the world, no knowledge check applied. No time for investigation since characters were dropping from the first round onwards, thus the cleric was mass healing every time. Diplomacy (the cleric was king of that with 50+ bonus) had no chance...
We played the campaign against further CR 25+ opponents, but never found out - even in hindsight - what we had been supposed to do.
The earth elemental only managed to grapple the beast 'cause the player of the elder earth elemental rolled like 20, 20, 19, 20, 19, 19. Everything lower would have failed...
I do not wish to derail this thread further. Please understand
1. there are situations where casters are not perfectly prepared or just have opponents that they cannot overcome
2. You may fail with a new strategy (e.g. casting reverse gravity) whereas you can simply go on with what currently works -> safer
3. Sometimes casters don't want to be the only ones that shine.
Cheers :-)
So the situation
Reverse gravity is sr no, which is why it works on golems.
You don't actually cast it on something, you literally change how gravity works in an area.
Again immune is immune.
You are simply wrong, you do not know the scenario. You did not read what I wrote about preparation time, availability of miracle and memorized spells.Just because someone does not act your way does not mean they are doing it wrong.
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To be fair, "Martials are better than casters when the DM massively stacks the deck against casters" isn't much of an argument.
To be fair, "Martials are better than casters when the DM massively stacks the deck against casters" isn't much of an argument.
Well, the physical stats did not favor martials either.
The idea of the example was something else:The DM thought martials don't matter.
Only casters should matter.
Thus the creature was optimized against casters and very difficult for martials.
He learned that martials DO matter, particularly when both work together.
Thus: martial + caster succeed where caster or martial alone fail. Thus the statement casters are always better and martials useless at high levels is wrong.
But let's not get into that territory here. It was addressed as an example to mplindustries about how different settings affect the utility of classes and that there are no universally true statements regarding that.
For this thread it's not very relevant :-)
And by the way, I never said martials are better, I said they matter and can be better depending on the situation. Like when a DM does not allow perfect preparation and perfect reconnaisance;-)
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Reverse gravity is sr no, which is why it works on golems.
You don't actually cast it on something, you literally change how gravity works in an area.
Again immune is immune.
You are simply wrong, you do not know the scenario. You did not read what I wrote about preparation time, availability of miracle and memorized spells.Just because someone does not act your way does not mean they are doing it wrong.
I understand that for this silly monster you refer too, immune = totally immune, have a nice day.
For reference however, golems, will-o-wisps, ect. who are "immune" to magic = immune to spells that allow SR only.
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Reverse gravity is sr no, which is why it works on golems.
You don't actually cast it on something, you literally change how gravity works in an area.
Again immune is immune.
You are simply wrong, you do not know the scenario. You did not read what I wrote about preparation time, availability of miracle and memorized spells.Just because someone does not act your way does not mean they are doing it wrong.
As much as I like where you are going.
Reverse gravity does not effect creatures. It effects gravity, which the golem is not immune to.
All SR no spells work on magic immune creatures.
Polymorph Focused Sorcerer (Abyssal Bloodline)
Making item list
Headband of mental Superiority +6 144,000g
Belt of Physical Perfection +6 144,000g
Bracers of Armor +8 64,000g
Amulet of Mighty Fist +5 100,000g
Ring of Protection +5 50,000g
Ring of Regeneration 90,000g
Cloak Of resistence +5 25,000g
+5 Str Wish 125,000g
+5 Cha Wish 125,000g
13,000g left over
Form of the dragon 3
Stats
Str 48
Dex 16
Con 28
Int 16
Wis 16
Cha 27
Saves: Fort 20, Ref 14, Will 20
AC: 36(8+8armor+8nat+5def+3dex+4shield)
Health: 302 (4+9+1+1)*20+2
Attack
+34/2d8+32; +34,+34/2d6+24; +29,+29/1d8+14; +29/2d6+32
Power Attack (-3)
+31/2d8+41; +31,+31/2d6+30; +26,+26/1d8+17; +26/2d6+41
Oops forgot to include the -2 size penalty for attacking.
Also note that your strength bonus from the abyssal bloodline is an inherent bonus, which does not stack with tomes or wishes (which are also inherent bonuses).
I wonder about that.
Wish and tomes don't stack, but they cannot exceed 5 either.
The bloodline does.
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Also note that your strength bonus from the abyssal bloodline is an inherent bonus, which does not stack with tomes or wishes (which are also inherent bonuses).I wonder about that.
Wish and tomes don't stack, but they cannot exceed 5 either.
The bloodline does.
What specifically is your wonderment on this issue?
What specifically is your wonderment on this issue?Also note that your strength bonus from the abyssal bloodline is an inherent bonus, which does not stack with tomes or wishes (which are also inherent bonuses).I wonder about that.
Wish and tomes don't stack, but they cannot exceed 5 either.
The bloodline does.
I'm trying to find where inherent bonuses are defined in the rules outside of Wish.
Because the bloodline bonus clearly doesn't work completely the same because it exceeds 5
Only Wish / Tomes are limited to 5. It isn't a general thing.
Exactly so where are inherent bonuses defined in the general rules?
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Just to throw gas on the fire, I think cavalier is better then both the fighter and monk. A few bonus feats, 4 skill points, nifty order abilities, the tactician and master tactician abilities adding cool teamwork feats without paying for them, banners giving modestly useful buffs to the rest of the party. There's a lot of cool stuff in that class, it surprises me more people don't think so. I guess the mount is what keeps people away.
Just to throw gas on the fire, I think cavalier is better then both the fighter and monk. A few bonus feats, 4 skill points, nifty order abilities, the tactician and master tactician abilities adding cool teamwork feats without paying for them, banners giving modestly useful buffs to the rest of the party. There's a lot of cool stuff in that class, it surprises me more people don't think so. I guess the mount is what keeps people away.
Yep. Mount is useless in the majority of adventures. Takes all the power of the class away. You can build around it. It gets pretty cheesy to do so. Riding your mount around dungeons, castle stairs, and general combat looks pretty lame. Makes your cavalier look like a Monty Python movie. When they are effective, they are real effective.
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Exactly so where are inherent bonuses defined in the general rules?
In comparison to 3.5, which explained all bonus types very thoroughly, Pathfinder does a poor job of this.
On page 11 of the CRB, you will find this statement:
Stacking: Stacking refers to the act of adding together bonuses or penalties that apply to one particular check or statistic. Generally speaking, most bonuses of the same type do not stack. Instead, only the highest bonus applies. Most penalties do stack, meaning that their values are added together. Penalties and bonuses generally stack with one another, meaning that the penalties might negate or exceed part or all of the bonuses, and vice versa.
In the entire book, the only bonus anywhere that is explicitly explained as stacking with itself is dodge bonuses.
You can read this thread for further details. Stacking
Exactly so where are inherent bonuses defined in the general rules?In comparison to 3.5, which explained all bonus types very thoroughly, Pathfinder does a poor job of this.
On page 11 of the CRB, you will find this statement:
Stacking: Stacking refers to the act of adding together bonuses or penalties that apply to one particular check or statistic. Generally speaking, most bonuses of the same type do not stack. Instead, only the highest bonus applies. Most penalties do stack, meaning that their values are added together. Penalties and bonuses generally stack with one another, meaning that the penalties might negate or exceed part or all of the bonuses, and vice versa.In the entire book, the only bonus anywhere that is explicitly explained as stacking with itself is dodge bonuses.
You can read this thread for further details. Stacking
And here I thought circumstance bonuses stacked.
Reverse gravity is sr no, which is why it works on golems.
You don't actually cast it on something, you literally change how gravity works in an area.
Again immune is immune.
You are simply wrong, you do not know the scenario. You did not read what I wrote about preparation time, availability of miracle and memorized spells.Just because someone does not act your way does not mean they are doing it wrong.
As much as I like where you are going.
Reverse gravity does not effect creatures. It effects gravity, which the golem is not immune to.
All SR no spells work on magic immune creatures.
I am surprised that no one pointed out the obvious. So the BBEG isn't immune to your Reverse Gravity? Hurray for you! It is still 100% pointless as the BBEG can fly. Flying down instead of up doesn't really change anything.
I really don't understand why people think this is such a great spell. Sure you could have the Tarrasque bob up in the air for a couple of minutes, but other than some fun it doesn't accomplish anything. By the time you get the spell between 13th and 15th level isn't everything flying already? That's the argument I keep hearing against the Monk's enhanced speed.
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I am surprised that no one pointed out the obvious. So the BBEG isn't immune to your Reverse Gravity? Hurray for you! It is still 100% pointless as the BBEG can fly. Flying down instead of up doesn't really change anything.
I really don't understand why people think this is such a great spell. Sure you could have the Tarrasque bob up in the air for a couple of minutes, but other than some fun it doesn't accomplish anything. By the time you get the spell between 13th and 15th level isn't everything flying already? That's the argument I keep hearing against the Monk's enhanced speed.
Regardless, I prefer arguments from a rules accurate perspective.
The rules are the shared premises for every poster in this thread. If we don't agree on the rules, the arguments and conclusions we make to each other are irrelevant.
To bring things slightly back to more on topic...
I have also had an experience with a very good DM that believed that spells were the way to go. In a 3.5 game that we played up to 20th level we finally came face-to-face with the BBEG. He started trowing out Save or Die, Save or Lose and debuff abilities that were entirely countered by our preparations (buffs, magic items, character abilities, etc.) or cancelled by our Wizard and Favored Soul.
Meanwhile the Wizard was unable to get any spells to land on him or really hinder him in anyway, for pretty much the same reasons in reverse. The Favored Soul's summoned monsters (Summon Monster IX with summoning focus) were not nearly powerful enough to do anything either.
The battle was won by the Barbarian, Fighter and Scout pouring on damage with holy weapons that ignored the BBEG's DR and overwhelmed his Fast Healing.
Now the Wizard and Favored Soul were the source of a large part of the parties buffs and immunities, so they were definitely MVPs, but it fell to the damage dealers to take out the bad guy before he managed to get through our defenses.
Oh, and as the Fighter was actually a two-weapon Fighter 10/Tempest 10, he totally could have been replaced with a Monk and would have done just as well, and probably have been a whole lot less squishy.
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In 3.5, if you played in the Eberron setting, a Fighter 4/Barbarian [Lion Totem] 1/Dervish 10/Revenant Blade 5 was a super badass melee.
Two-Weapon Fighting with a double bladed scimitar, with each hand attacking as though it was being wielded 2-handed for the purpose of Strength and Power Attack.
Pounce, at-will forever.
The ability to full-attack while moving (you could make one attack per 5 ft. movement up to your full # of attacks), and a +5 to hit and damage from class features while attacking in such a way.
Spellcasters were a lot more absolute in 3.5, though. Without mord's disjunction to make them mortal again, you had no prayer. Heck even with it, if the enemy caster was prepped to handle it, you were still on the short end of the stick.
On the reverse end, 3.5 had no protection from antimagic field, where as Pathfinder does.
Lot of trade offs between editions, revisions, new games, ect.
Lormyr, once again you effectively show off your extreme system mastery, this time of D&D 3.5. That's great and all, but most mere humans don't attain such mastery. Also, we only played with the Core and the first 4 complete books (Adventure, Arcane, Divine and Warrior).
In a similar vein we only play with Pathfinder core plus the Advanced Players Guide. Anything after that (in my humble opinion) suffers from diminishing returns. Anything gained is overshadowed by poor balance and over complication. I'm sure some people love the Mythic rules, but I wouldn't touch them with a Mythic 10' Pole of Awesome. ;-)
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Without the forgotten realms or eberron specific campaign books, 3.5 was not nearly so bad. Playing in either of those settings, or just allowing players to dip into those books (not my cup of tea if not playing the setting) really did crazy things to game balance.
I can understand your position though, Lord Twig. I personally like extensive character options because it allows you to come up with really fun combinations of character capabilities. I too am not a fan of mythic rules at all, though. I did not enjoy 3rd edition epic nonsense either. With the current amount of books we have access too, 20 character levels is more than enough option for me.
Lormyr, once again you effectively show off your extreme system mastery, this time of D&D 3.5. That's great and all, but most mere humans don't attain such mastery. Also, we only played with the Core and the first 4 complete books (Adventure, Arcane, Divine and Warrior).
In a similar vein we only play with Pathfinder core plus the Advanced Players Guide. Anything after that (in my humble opinion) suffers from diminishing returns. Anything gained is overshadowed by poor balance and over complication. I'm sure some people love the Mythic rules, but I wouldn't touch them with a Mythic 10' Pole of Awesome. ;-)
I love Mythic rules!
Basically usable divine ranks and/or epic levels.
My characters now tend to be a mix of CRB, Ultimate Campaign, and Mythic Adventures.
Without the forgotten realms or eberron specific campaign books, 3.5 was not nearly so bad. Playing in either of those settings, or just allowing players to dip into those books (not my cup of tea if not playing the setting) really did crazy things to game balance.
I can understand your position though, Lord Twig. I personally like extensive character options because it allows you to come up with really fun combinations of character capabilities. I too am not a fan of mythic rules at all, though. I did not enjoy 3rd edition epic nonsense either. With the current amount of books we have access too, 20 character levels is more than enough option for me.
What I like about mythic rules is that it more or less replaces character optimization.
Oh you are building your barbar to have pounce?
Well the fighter just got pounce-but-better as his 3rd mythic path ability.
Oh paragon surge human sorcerer with racial heritage half-elf?
Well my half-orc CRB sorcerer just got access to every spell ever with the archmage mythic path ability.
Oh you have spell perfection dazing maximized chain lightning?
Well we now have mythic spells.
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What I like about mythic rules is that it more or less replaces character optimization.
Oh you are building your barbar to have pounce?
Well the fighter just got pounce-but-better as his 3rd mythic path ability.Oh paragon surge human sorcerer with racial heritage half-elf?
Well my half-orc CRB sorcerer just got access to every spell ever with the archmage mythic path ability.Oh you have spell perfection dazing maximized chain lightning?
Well we now have mythic spells.
I grant you, that is a nice feature about it, unless your optimizers also min-max the mythic stuff on top of it all.
I am just of the mind that characters have enough "stuff" by 20th level, and adding anything more is just nutty. Especially considering how poorly mythic monsters scale in comparison.
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Mythic has it's ups and downs. I don't care for it personally, but it has more to do with the fact that it forces me to change my character concept rather then simple continuing to play a more powerful version of my original concept (like epic does). Basically my fighter is no longer a fighter but a fighter/champion combo, plus the way mythic is designed the champion part starts to outshine the fighter part rather quickly.
Epic on the other hand is just continuing down the path you already laid out for your character. More of the same if you will. The numbers get higher (that doesn't bother me), and you get new stuff along the same theme as what you got before (also ok with me). But ultimately it's just a more powerful version of your original concept. Unfortunately 3.5 epic was very broken, and needed about half the system rewritten to function, it was possibly but a lot of hard work (and I did exactly that rewrote half of it). It all about choices really, some people love mythic some epic some both some neither, it's all good to me.
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Yeah PF does a crap job of explaining bonus types and dont get me started on the fact that a sacred and a profane bonus will stack. Its silly worse than that its poor design.
I thought it was pretty clear. Bonus of the same type do not stack with the excpetion of dodge bonuses. Bonuses without type stack. IS there some strange exception or misinterpretation on my part?
I grant you, that is a nice feature about it, unless your optimizers also min-max the mythic stuff on top of it all.
I am just of the mind that characters have enough "stuff" by 20th level, and adding anything more is just nutty. Especially considering how poorly mythic monsters scale in comparison.
Mythic suffers from the same problem epic and high level play does. Creating appropriate challenges is on the GM.
Also mythic characters just play differently than normal characters.
4 encounter adventuring day? Pfffff that's not mythic. Mythic characters fight weeklong battles against wave after wave of enemies. Only when the PCs are most desperate do the Mythic monsters come out with a small army of non-mythic fodder.
Mythic characters are lucky to get an hour break in-between sets of 4-5 encounters.
Challenging mythic characters becomes a question of scale not kind.
Yeah PF does a crap job of explaining bonus types and dont get me started on the fact that a sacred and a profane bonus will stack. Its silly worse than that its poor design.I thought it was pretty clear. Bonus of the same type do not stack with the excpetion of dodge bonuses. Bonuses without type stack. IS there some strange exception or misinterpretation on my part?
circumstance bonuses DO stack and they are not dodge bonuses.
Mythic has it's ups and downs. I don't care for it personally, but it has more to do with the fact that it forces me to change my character concept rather then simple continuing to play a more powerful version of my original concept (like epic does). Basically my fighter is no longer a fighter but a fighter/champion combo, plus the way mythic is designed the champion part starts to outshine the fighter part rather quickly.
Epic on the other hand is just continuing down the path you already laid out for your character. More of the same if you will. The numbers get higher (that doesn't bother me), and you get new stuff along the same theme as what you got before (also ok with me). But ultimately it's just a more powerful version of your original concept. Unfortunately 3.5 epic was very broken, and needed about half the system rewritten to function, it was possibly but a lot of hard work (and I did exactly that rewrote half of it). It all about choices really, some people love mythic some epic some both some neither, it's all good to me.
I'll agree with that. Mythic is more like divine ranks than epic levels. Hence why you don't need XP to get them.
And by the way, I never said martials are better, I said they matter and can be better depending on the situation. Like when a DM does not allow perfect preparation and perfect reconnaisance;-)
And when the GM pretty much just said "No spells work... at all".... I mean, really? Your arguing that melee has a place in a fight in which your GM SPECIFICALLY WENT OUT OF HIS WAY TO TELL THE CASTERS TO GO SCREW THEMSELVES. Really? This is going to be your arguement? Hell, if you want to roll that way then lets see how useful the fighter is against something that has 100% immunity to all weapons, has a CMD of 150, and is immune to crits?
Hell, if you want to roll that way then lets see how useful the fighter is against something that has 100% immunity to all weapons, has a CMD of 150, and is immune to crits?
Those last two come up a lot
60+ CMD, Heavy fortification or outright immunity to crits
circumstance bonuses DO stack and they are not dodge bonuses.Yeah PF does a crap job of explaining bonus types and dont get me started on the fact that a sacred and a profane bonus will stack. Its silly worse than that its poor design.I thought it was pretty clear. Bonus of the same type do not stack with the excpetion of dodge bonuses. Bonuses without type stack. IS there some strange exception or misinterpretation on my part?
Agreed. Per page 208 of the CRB
"With the exception of dodge bonuses, most circumstance bonuses, and racial bonuses, only the better bonus of a given type works."
On the reverse end, 3.5 had no protection from antimagic field, where as Pathfinder does.
Pathfinder has a protection against antimagic field? What/where?
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Im seeing a good bit of armchair gaming here because of some of the comments with regardsto players playing it wrong if their wizard doesnt dominate the game. I have never everseen a wizard, or any other spellcaster succeed alone. Also, cherry picking abilities from multiple books is one thing when building a character to post on a forum, but doing that during an actual game can be different.