When I am exploring a location, i am usually pretty disappointed to encounter a potion. I usually don't even attempt the check and just put it back in the box. Even if I attempt it and acquire it, it will probably go to my discard pile anyway. I have only used potions twice in the many, many games I have played.
So, why do I find potions not useful?
1) Many are too situational, and in a small hand size they waste space. The type of encounter that they are useful on may not occur.
2) there are many other items that can be acquired that help on specific checks that do not need to be banished after using.
3) craft has no meaning to any character in the game at this point.
The role card for Sajan Drunken Master, looks to take advantage of potions. Very curious to see how that works out, but at this point, I'll be choosing Zen Archer for him, since building a strategy around potions seems really weak.
i'd enjoy hearing how potions are working in other players games. Maybe I am missing something.
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I use potions when they come up. Can you actually deliberately fail to check for a boon? I was under the impression that you had to try to get it, at least with your base die.
Yes, they usually end up being dead weight in your hand, unless you are playing one of the many characters that can recharge/discard an arbitrary card for a bonus, in which case they are great for that. Every card you acquire is an extra hit point as well.
Healing potions tend to get used as soon as anyone has 4 cards in their discard. I think I used a glibness once when it was in my hand when an ally came up. I suspect if healing potions were Basic we would see them in more decks as emergency healing.
I never keep potions between scenarios. Maybe when we get the alchemist he'll have craft and perhaps an ability to recharge or bury potions instead of banishing them.
Great points.
There are a few potions like the potion of healing that are very useful. But, the majority of them are not so great. They do add extra hp, when shuffled back into you deck, but that can sometimes clog up your hand when you draw them later on, but Characters that rely on discard or bury powers can benefit from them like you said.
In terms not rolling for the card, what i mean is that sometimes a character will have no chance of acquiring a card with the skill selected.
So potion of gracefulness needs craft or intelligence 6 to acquire.
If i am Seelah, my unmodified intelligence is d4 and untrained craft is d4.
If I'm not interested in the card, and don't plan on using powers/cards to help the check, why bother rolling the d4 if I need to get a six.
There are lots of times this happens in the game especially playing solo or with another character. Some cards will not be of use and can not be acquired with the base die, so they just go back to the box.
But, if i have a chance to roll then I will go for it, but I'm still not sure it is mandatory
Recently i read it is not for recharge attmepts..
If you only have a small party and you are missing or weak in an ability you need to close one of the locations then loading up with an approprate potion before you set off might be one use.
I generally try to acquire them, but rarely use them. They can help to fill out your hand instead of drawing from you deck, which occasionally has its uses. They can also make good cards to be used for activating other abilities (i.e. Harsk's recharge a card to add a d4, Lini's discard to shapeshift, etc.). However, if I ever need to discard something, any potions in my hand are generally the first to go, UNLESS I see a difficult check coming.
So yeah, overall, they're kind of throw-away cards... but who knows? Maybe they'll get much more useful late on for certain difficult checks. Potion of Ghostly form certainly has potential, and potion of healing is already not horrible for certain characters who would otherwise lack healing.
That's one of the reasons why my Sajan will probably go down the Drunken Master route - oft-seen & easily acquired, they're free hit points for the scenario, and very occasionally they turn out to be useful. Who needs *another* ranged combat character???
...especially one with no weapons in his deck!
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...especially one with no weapons in his deck!
He can take up to 3 card feats to add weapons. And the Zen Archer role has power feats that make it easier for him to get ranged weapons, and to recharge them instead of discarding. Once we get that far in the adventure path, I'll certainly try it out just to see how it works out.
But that's three card feats just to get him to 3 weapons in an 18+ card deck. My hunch is that it will be better to use those feats somewhere else and ignore the weapons completely, but this is just conjecture until we actually get as far as those Adventures!
Potions are extremely situational but when they match up with what you need, they're awesome. In my last game I had to plunge into the Woods to thin out the monsters even though I knew I'd never be able to make the roll to close the location. What did I find in there? A Potion of Ruggedness! Instant success when I got the chance to close. I'll grant you, such situations aren't going to happen a lot, but when they do it makes for a really great moment in the game.
Other than the potion of healing, we ditch them as soon as possible. What we decided was that they are far too specific to be worth holding onto.
Maybe one of the future adventures will have an item that's a special case for holding potions and then you can just keep all of the potions as a sideboard. :)
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Look at Sajan's Druken Master specialty. You add 6 to the check for any Boon with the Liquid trait which means you'll always succeed as most of them are 4-6. Plus, you get to recharge them on a Fortitude 6 check (a d6+2 base). That's probably going to be the only character that I'd ever give potions to provided he finds them after the 3rd Adventure is finished.
That really does seem to be the only reason they're in the game. Most of them are basic, so if there's no Sajan in your group with that specialty, I suspect most groups will just remove them from the game by the time they get that far.
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All of the following are in the Basic Set (B) but not all of them have the basic trait.
Holy Water - Liquid, Magic, Divine, Basic
Potion of Fortitude - Liquid, Alchemical, Basic
Potion of Glibness - Liquid, Alchemical, Basic
Potion of Hiding - Liquid, Alchemical, Basic
Potion of Vision - Liquid, Alchemical, Basic
Potion of Gracefulness - Liquid, Alchemical, Elite
Potion of Ruggedness - Liquid, Alchemical, Elite
Potion of Energy Resistance - Liquid, Alchemical
Potion of Ghostly Form - Liquid, Alchemical
Potion of Healing - Liquid, Alchemical, Healing
There are also versons of some of these in the Character Add-on Deck (C).
Do not forget, once the adventure has progressed far enough, banishing the basic boons is optional.
The first 5 will be gone as soon as i get a chance.
I've never used any of them.
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I think I plan on "super-banishing" pretty much all basic cards whenever I get the chance. It seems to me that 99% of the time the optimal choice is to get the weaker boons out to increase the chances of getting better stuff.
We need a cool term for "removed from the game." Eradicated?
Perma-banish?
We need a cool term for "removed from the game." Eradicated?
I prefer "Abolish." So we'd have
revealrecharge
display
discard
bury
banish
abolish
shred?
How about "feed"? As in, "I'm going to feed this Potion of Hiding card to my pet rabbit, because that's all it's good for."Perma-banish?
We need a cool term for "removed from the game." Eradicated?I prefer "Abolish." So we'd have
reveal
recharge
display
discard
bury
banish
abolish
I'll only accept this one if 1) we get to have said rabbit in Lini's deck and 2) feeding it potions makes it a better card over time ;)
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I'll only accept this one if 1) we get to have said rabbit in Lini's deck and 2) feeding it potions makes it a better card over time ;)How about "feed"? As in, "I'm going to feed this Potion of Hiding card to my pet rabbit, because that's all it's good for."Perma-banish?
We need a cool term for "removed from the game." Eradicated?I prefer "Abolish." So we'd have
reveal
recharge
display
discard
bury
banish
abolish
I didn't mean a rabbit card. I meant my actual pet rabbit, whose hobbies include shredding paper and chewing on cardboard. There are a couple of cards in the game I'd consider feeding to him, just to get them out of the way for the good stuff, starting with the short sword and quarterstaff, actually.
@Fromper - send a picture of the little fella in to Paizo and maybe they can turn him into a promo card ;)