Warlock School Abilities - Action Cost?

[GhostwheelX]

I know it's not official Paizo material, but.......

What happens if a Warlock takes a School Ability that requires an action which is not a standard action, such as Shift? Is the ability still a standard action, or is it a swift action?

It says, "Using a school ability is a standard action," but would you rule that something like Shift becomes a swift action since the original ability is one?

[GhostwheelX]

Another quick question while we're at it, do School Abilities have somatic components? (Could you cast them while tied up, grappled, paralyzed, and so on?)

[RJGrady]

I can't even figure out if the cantrips are spells. Also, the author doesn't know how damage reduction works.

[YuenglingDragon]

I wish I had good answers. I wanted to use this for my last character and came away from my reading with so many questions that I didn't even want to bring it to my GM for his approval.

Into the Breach: The Oracle has a Warlock that you might prefer. I wasn't coming here to plug our new book, just making sure that the question wasn't about the Warlock in the book. But I figured since I was here...

[HorrorshowJack]

I've both played and currently allow the class as a GM. I'm fond of the class, but it has some screwups due to being released the same day as Pathfinder.

My takes:
School abilities take a standard action or listed action, whichever is less.

For DR pick Cold Iron, Silver or Magic as your vulnerability. You can't get rid of it, but it scales as listed.

Give option of bonus feats instead of med/heavy armor mastery. They don't get proficiency with the heavier armors and their school abilities are supernaturals so it's kind of a moot point. Seriously who cares about losing a cantrip?

Fill in the blank levels with two additional cantrips. 2 for 1 should also be the exchange rate for school abilities. Nobody would ever take just a cantrip instead.

Change arcane burst etc to a reflex save instead of a touch attack. It makes no sense that you can miss a blurred opponent who is still in the blast radius.

@ghostwheelx Nope. School abilities are supernatural so you can use them while grappled etc, and they don't provoke attacks of opportunity. Also ignores spell resistance. Downside is you can't crit them.

@Yuenglingdragon Into the breach's version is the only thing in pathfinder with unlimited healing capabilities. Additionally there aren't enough useful revelations to fill in the class unless your gm is allowing all the 3rd party ones.