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Hmm, curious about something, would the Lesser Spirit Totem rage power be able to attack invisible foes?
While raging, the barbarian is surrounded by spirit wisps that harass her foes. These spirits make one slam attack each round against a living foe that is adjacent to the barbarian. This slam attack is made using the barbarian's full base attack bonus, plus the barbarian's Charisma modifier. The slam deals 1d4 points of negative energy damage, plus the barbarian's Charisma modifier.Rereading it it seems like it's an auto-attack rather than the Babarian having to pinpoint a specific enemy, but I might just be overthinking it due to the thematics of the ability.
The ability is a little bit odd for a few reasons, but one of them is the weirdness on exactly how the attack comes around. Technically it doesn't even say that the barbarian chooses which living foe the spirits attack, which could mean they could still attack while the barbarian is unable to take any actions or even realize the fight is happening (say the barbarian's mind is in a mindscape while raging), but then who the heck decides? We have a spirit totem barbarian in the CotCT game in which I am a PC, and the GM has essentially allowed the barbarian player, Linda, to play the spirit as if it was a separate friendly entity, and we've applied all the same miss chances as normal.
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What's your top 5 books and/or series'?More recently, my little brother convinced me to read the Dresden Files. It wasn't an easy sell because I'm not really a fan of most urban fantasy, but Butcher won me over with his sense of humor and his fun take on the fey.
While I love Dresden files I would never describe Mab as fun.
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So... Horror Adventures is out in people's hands...
Lets just say I murdered an orphanage full of children and then raised them all for my undead army. Once done, as a wizard, I then cast Protection from Evil... say 5 times, using up 2nd level slots, just to be sure.What alignment am I?
I know you said you're not here any more, but it's a solid question. While the details may not be identical, I'm partial to something similar to something that looks like what James Jacobs said to a similar question here. It also matters to me whether we're talking a spell that has an alignment descriptor because it does something particularly strong in that alignment vs those that don't; not all spells are created equal (protection from X is always the example mainly because it's a pretty wimpy aligned act, whereas the spell that tortures a trapped outsider to get bonuses to coercing it is more solidly so). Either way, whenever a rule says GM discretion with a rule of thumb, don't use that rule of thumb in situations where the rule of thumb produces bad results.
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Hi Mark, hope you are having fun at GenCon and travel and such worked out for you. Have any pleasant surprises out there yet?
GenCon had many fun moments, and I got to meet a whole bunch of great fans, freelancers, and more. As always, it's a lot of hard work, but it's worth it. Of course, Delta screwing up our flights so we were stuck in Michigan on the way home was pretty lousy. At least it wasn't on the way there; that would have been an unmitigated disaster!
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In fantasy fiction of various stripes, the archetype of the everyman (or at least someone not steeped in occult lore or power) with unshakable will and determination is pretty common.
On the flip side, supernatural horror that deals with insanity often has the archetype of the mad scholar or cultist: Someone who digs too deep for dark truths their mind isn't ready for or was too willing to embrace eldritch forces they can't comprehend or are simply unable to resist dark temptations.
So I'm curious what thought process went into reversing those concepts for Horror Adventures. Instead the outsider, like a fighter or rogue, is all but guaranteed to lose their mind while a sorcerer or wizard instead has a mind like a fortress.
I actually brought that up as a possibility, as it was something I'd encountered as a trope, but I have only a surface knowledge of the appropriate literature, and those with more experience than I explained that the high Int people weren't worse at keeping their sanity due to being smart but instead due to the actions they chose to take (delving into sanity-harming knowledge that should be left alone).
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Remembertodrinklotsofwaterandcaffiene.
Iamacoffeepersonmyself, whatisyourpreference?
I go for decaf tea, for the most part, for my tea/coffee fix.
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What are your favorite time travel movies.
And, what are your least favorite time travel movies.
I strongly dislike time travel movies with a closed time loop (example: the protagonist, who would have certainly died and not lived to go into the future, is saved by the protagonist from the future, then lives to repeat those same actions to fulfill the closed time loop, such as in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban) because the tension and progression of the story are irrelevant, as the only thing saving the protagonist is the deus ex machina of the time loop being chosen by the author to inevitably include saving the character (also, in a world with that kind of causality-free closed time loop, it means free will is non-existent, as those timelines physically can't allow Harry to do things differently, down to the potential wording of any statements, even if he just wanted to see if he could be different). A version of that same situation without a closed time loop might have involved Harry dying, Hermione from Harry-is-dead-future saving him with a time turner, and then perhaps (depends on how the multiverse of altered time resolves) Hermione from Harry-is-alive future going back in time to match her other timeline's actions. I'm OK with almost any other take on it, though Legends of Tomorrow had a lot of annoying face-palming inexplicably dumb (I guess explicably with the end retcon-seeming revelation of "Hur hur we controlled you to be dumb") choices being made.
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There are a lot of captain yesterdays. Is there at least one captain today? Or tomorrow?
Maybe. Captain Today might just be a pizza-delivery guy, though. Captain Tomorrow is an alternate version of the DC hero Tommy Tomorrow.
What are your favorite time travel movies.
And, what are your least favorite time travel movies.
I strongly dislike time travel movies with a closed time loop (example: the protagonist, who would have certainly died and not lived to go into the future, is saved by the protagonist from the future, then lives to repeat those same actions to fulfill the closed time loop, such as in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban) because the tension and progression of the story are irrelevant, as the only thing saving the protagonist is the deus ex machina of the time loop being chosen by the author to inevitably include saving the character (also, in a world with that kind of causality-free closed time loop, it means free will is non-existent, as those timelines physically can't allow Harry to do things differently, down to the potential wording of any statements, even if he just wanted to see if he could be different). A version of that same situation without a closed time loop might have involved Harry dying, Hermione from Harry-is-dead-future saving him with a time turner, and then perhaps (depends on how the multiverse of altered time resolves) Hermione from Harry-is-alive future going back in time to match her other timeline's actions. I'm OK with almost any other take on it, though Legends of Tomorrow had a lot of annoying face-palming inexplicably dumb (I guess explicably with the end retcon-seeming revelation of "Hur hur we controlled you to be dumb") choices being made.
While I totally understand (and accept) that as a valid reason to dislike such things, I hedge my dislike by the following: I disagree with the fundamental notion that (in such works) free will is as free as we tend to think of it and I still maintain that an individual has as much unique value based on their own individualism of self.
For example: the reason the closed time loop was a closed time loop was because Harry was himself; had Harry not been himself, the timeloop wouldn't have been closed, and we would have had a temporal anomaly and causality would have been damaged.
Thus, the tension is left in the fact that they very well could have been destroyed; beyond which, until Harry closed the loop and summoned the patronus, there was no way to know the loop was closed (at least, not for sure), outside of Harry's faith. But more to the point, the tension there wasn't the tension between, "Will they be saved, or won't they?" - it's not that kind of time-travel story (and, after all, having "The Boy Who Lived" die brutally at that point in the series would up the rating beyond what she was aiming for, at the time): the tension, instead, is in Harry's sense of self-discovery, and of learning that his father, to some extent, lives on within himself.
That said, in the story, Hermione has had it very deeply impressed on her that she must avoid running into herself, in order to avoid something sinister happening. We're not told directly what at the time, but it's been noted elsewhere that mucking about with time is dangerous enough that a few people who've tried to go back and alter the past have effectively instead consistently written themselves out of reality (with a few memories, written records, and accouterments to "prove" they used to exist).
This points to a different apparent-flaw in the work: the "luck" factor of Harry in stumbling into a closed time-loop. In that novel by itself, I can certainly see the criticism (though it still doesn't bother me - I'll get to it below, though I've mentioned it above). Yet, again, within the work as a whole, there's something significant going on: Harry has an incredibly powerful spell going on that, while it doesn't control his actions, does influence them, informing him of a great many things, subconsciously, and often putting him in the right place at the right time - a spell put in place by his mother and sealed by Voldemordt.
But even if that isn't accepted, I don't really have a problem with it, because the HP universe is pretty explicit in one of its over-arching themes: it doesn't matter what situation you're in: the nature of yourself is determined by your choices and your actions within that context; you have your innate nature and your chosen nature, and those two things work together to build the "real you" that is who you are in the world.
In this case, Harry was who he was (his innate nature), and so followed Hermione's rules as much as possible (avoiding causing a disturbance as much as possible, with a few quirks) resulting in a closed time loop. He wasn't out to change the past, but to affect the present. It was this (and his nature to both believe, but also to act, when necessary, instead of just relying on vague unsubstantiated belief) which permitted the time-loop to be closed in the first place.
Otherwise, you'd have a couple of kids just kind of vanish, and the series come to a rather inglorious and uninteresting end (or else the time travel rules would be really differently written).
But that's just me.
:)
As an aside, what do you think about Chrono Trigger? What about Chrono Cross? Chrono Break? Red Alert 2? Ocarina of Time? The official Zelda Timeline?
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Would you consider Kineticists that gain abilities from other planes of existence, such as Mechanus, The First World, or the Maelstrom? A Kineticist that channels the Eye of Abendago?
A think a Kineticist with ties to the Boneyard or First World would be quite interesting.
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Would you consider Kineticists that gain abilities from other planes of existence, such as Mechanus, The First World, or the Maelstrom? A Kineticist that channels the Eye of Abendago?
A think a Kineticist with ties to the Boneyard or First World would be quite interesting.
I for one really like that idea.
Also kineticists that draw their power from the Abyss or Hell or the Dark Tapestry or whatever. My original idea was to suggest 'pact kineticists' that make deals with powerful outsiders and draw their power that way, but Azten's makes more sense and is more fluff neutral. Cool idea.
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I can only hope they are done with much more care than all the Paizo Kineticist archetypes before them, if they are done at all.
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I know you said you're not here any more, but it's a solid question. While the details may not be identical, I'm partial to something similar to something that looks like what James Jacobs said to a similar question here. It also matters to me whether we're talking a spell that has an alignment descriptor because it does something particularly strong in that alignment vs those that don't; not all spells are created equal (protection from X is always the example mainly because it's a pretty wimpy aligned act, whereas the spell that tortures a trapped outsider to get bonuses to coercing it is more solidly so). Either way, whenever a rule says GM discretion with a rule of thumb, don't use that rule of thumb in situations where the rule of thumb produces bad results.
I really like this answer. My favorite bit was unpacking this:
"While the details may not be identical, I'm partial to something similar to something that looks like what James Jacobs said to a similar question.."
:)
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The ability is a little bit odd for a few reasons, but one of them is the weirdness on exactly how the attack comes around. Technically it doesn't even say that the barbarian chooses which living foe the spirits attack, which could mean they could still attack while the barbarian is unable to take any actions or even realize the fight is happening (say the barbarian's mind is in a mindscape while raging), but then who the heck decides? We have a spirit totem barbarian in the CotCT game in which I am a PC, and the GM has essentially allowed the barbarian player, Linda, to play the spirit as if it was a separate friendly entity, and we've applied all the same miss chances as normal.Hmm, curious about something, would the Lesser Spirit Totem rage power be able to attack invisible foes?
While raging, the barbarian is surrounded by spirit wisps that harass her foes. These spirits make one slam attack each round against a living foe that is adjacent to the barbarian. This slam attack is made using the barbarian's full base attack bonus, plus the barbarian's Charisma modifier. The slam deals 1d4 points of negative energy damage, plus the barbarian's Charisma modifier.Rereading it it seems like it's an auto-attack rather than the Babarian having to pinpoint a specific enemy, but I might just be overthinking it due to the thematics of the ability.
Okies, thanks for responding :3
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Can I use oversized one-handed firearm?
It seems like you can (presumably up to the limit you can even hold), but the rules in UC seem confusing to me (ranged weapons don't by default belong to one-handed and two-handed melee categories, and firearms don't specifically define what they're doing, plus a sentence in there about not changing that I think might be meant to prevent you from dual-wielding Small muskets but I don't understand fully). I'll have to ask Stephen at some point.
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Mark.
Maaaaaaarrrrrk
Super-serious series of questions*:
*
If you could have 1d4 different super-powers, what would they be and why?
(Assume corollary powers required to make a given power work are part of it; i.e. Since you'd need super tensile strength/durability to, you know, not-die when you made use of your super-strength power, you get them both when you say "super strength" as a singular option.)
Why?If, instead, you could be a gestalt of 1d2+1 super heroes, who would you gestalt to be yourself? Why? Which comic universe would you run around in? Would you prefer to be in that one, or this one?
On the other hand: BAM! You just gained 3d6+2 levels in a Pathfinder class (or classes)! Which class(es) do you pick, and why? Incidentally, if you could spontaneously switch races, would you? And if so, to which?
Similarly, you won the super-lottery, and gained mythic tiers! 3d3+1 of 'em! (And you gain class levels to match; please feel free to change your previous answer if this does so for some reason.) What path do you take? (Alternate option: substitute a single tier for a simple mythic template.)
Yet another query: you monster. Specifically, you [dice=CR]d30 (or less) monster! Which are you?! ... and would this have been your first choice? If not, which would be?
But the wheels of fate-time have spun again, and your everything has been transposed into that of someone else! You've just become a prepublished NPC from an official source! Which prepublished NPC is it?
What campaign setting do you run around in? Why?
As a final thing: blend any and/or all of the above questions into a single ginormous question: an optional blend of a prepublished NPC, monster, and some superheroes all walk into a bar... and out comes you, as a gestalt of those guys, the race you choose, some extra superpowers, and have extra class levels and mythic tiers on top! What are you?! (Other than "awesome"...
I seem to have lucked out (powerwise) with the RNG here. Absolute maximum in all categories but number of class levels.
Superpowers: My #1 superpower option is a "book mastery" power of my own invention from when I was younger and people asked me this question. It would allow me to touch a book in order to permanently gain the abilities (magic system, etc) from any character or creature in the book until used again, or to enter the universe of the book, where I could meddle with the story due to my seemingly-prophetic powers. #2 is the non-determinism ability to rewind as far as I want and try other options, triggered either voluntarily or automatically under certain fail conditions. I haven't really gone beyond my top 2 much, but invulnerability to most types of harm (and the ability to share it with others), could be handy. Also, I guess if there were other supers, the ability to absorb and gain the powers of other supers who try to use their powers against me could be useful, especially if paired with the invulnerability in case frightened supers used mundane means to get rid of me for having that power.
Superheroes: I'm not familiar with any heroes who have my first two powers, per se (I suppose the protagonist of the anime Erased has something similar to #2, but only involuntary based on the plot), but I would generally try to grab the powers from the first question. To get power #4, I should add in Amazo (I'll go for the non-villainous transcendent version from latter day Justice League: Unlimited). He doesn't seem to mimic magic as much as other powers, so add in some kind of spellcaster superhero. A lot of them seem to either be pretty limited or to have some kind of raw deal (Dr. Fate is possessed by Nabu, Morgan le Fay needs to drain life energy to stay alive, etc); Dr. Strange does OK in that regard, but he's mostly tied to getting power from other entities and magic items. The god characters from Wonder Woman's rogue's gallery seem to have a good time with it though. For instance, in the JLU episode "This Little Piggy", Circe basically casts a bunch of spells with no consequences or price, all the while Batman is getting a lesson that magic usually comes at a price, and even in the end, she makes Batman sing a song and goes off on her way. So let's add that to Amazo. I'm pretty overpowered at this point and probably would just wind up adding some kind of super-weakness if I added someone else with powers, so let's throw in Batman for plot-device levels of cunning and preparedness. I'll pick the DC world over Marvel because the Marvel world in general tends to be more skeptical/uninviting to its heroes (e.g. Spiderman, X-men), which is great for comic plots but not great for me. Our universe is even better because presumably supervillains aren't killing people here all the time, and I could probably stop the smaller-time villains of our world with that superhero suite.
Class and race: Alright, this is the only question where the RNG didn't put me at the very top of the power curve, since I'm at level 12, barely below average for the roll. Due to being Int-heavy, I would probably go wizard. Elf could be a fun race.
Mythic: With 10 tiers, definitely Archmage (probably Dual Path to cherrypick from somewhere else too). If I'm actually going to be fighting things, it's almost surely worth it to trade one of those tiers for the Agile simple template and act twice in a round.
Monster: Only the demigods are even at CR 30, and the only one that isn't some kind of horrible Great Old One or demon is Cernunnos, so let's go with him. If I'm willing to take a lower CR Empyreal Lord, Korada, or maybe <redacted B6> would fit me better personality-wise than Cernunnos, though honestly they still aren't great matches due to being demigods. If we're talking in the realm of uncertainty (not in any book), the Eldest Shyka or Magdh might be amusing; they seem like they would be CR 30 or under.
NPC: Given the NPC needs to be published in an official source, I'm assuming the statblock is important, and we're not talking about unstatted NPCs with amusing personalities. Given that I have all these mythic ranks and stuff, maybe Old Mage Jatembe. He's pretty fun. Otherwise maybe one of the Chosen of Mystra from FR, but they were a bit deus-ex-machina (and some kind of Mary Sue-ish), which is not true of Jatembe.
Campaign Setting: Probably not any of my homebrewed settings. They aren't always great places to live. Perhaps Eberron, since the NPCs are intentionally really low-level, so I won't find many if any threats to me as whatever the heck I am from the above list, whereas Golarion, FR, and the like are still full of plenty of threats at or above my paygrade.
Gestalt: Uhh, well I'm gestalting between a demigod from Pathfinder as well as numerous powerful superhero abilities and powerful (but relatively tepid given how ridiculous everything else is) mythic arcane spellcasting. I guess I'm basically full deity level at that point? I mean, I should be able to out-duel Cayden, especially since I can touch his holy book and gain all of his powers too from my #1 superpower.
Legend of Zelda: Anything except Windwaker or Link's Awakening (and preferentially Link's Awakening before Windwaker) because destroying a world is bad, though destroying a dream world is less bad. Seriously, I prefer Ganon's plan to the King of the Red Lions.
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Mark,
Shouldn't multiple account syndrome have been an insanity in Horror Adventures?
It might be more of an April Fool's version, but on the other hand, we didn't want to use real-world conditions when possible (working completely in the realm of fantasy where we could), and that name does hew kind of close to Dissociative Identity Disorder / Multiple Personality Disorder, which, at least when I last took a CogSci course several ago, is contentious as a diagnosis.
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Mr. Mark Seifter,
What do you call that feeling you get when you realize that you set up a situation in game that if things get fubared enough or if the players try hard enough they could literally change the face of the planet and kill millions of people... Or worse?
On a related note: What effect would Avistan suddenly disappearing have on the rest of the planet?
It's a sense of gravitas or weight of an epic-scale campaign's denouement, I suppose, like when the PCs in my Red Tide campaign burst into the Realm of the Immortals (much harder to reach than the gods' realm in Pathfinder and many other published cosmologies) to try to stop the Big Bad from destroying their crapsack world, building a new nicer one, and sending all the people's souls there to be reborn.
I would imagine that having a continent vanish on any planet would have severe effects on the climate and weather of the surrounding area, particularly Western Casmaron would become coastline, which would be different than it is now. Also, it would destabilize the geopolitical situation in the surrounding region quite a bit. But I think life would go on, and hey, no more Worldwound, Gallowspire, etc.
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How do psychics not have telekinetic volley on their spell list? Levitating a bunch of objects to fling at enemies seems like such a classic psychic thing.
Because it's from a Player Companion that was written before Occult Adventures came out, most likely. In a home game that had both RTT and OA options, it would make sense to give that spell to a psychic too.
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Mr. Mark Seifter,
What do you call that feeling you get when you realize that you set up a situation in game that if things get fubared enough or if the players try hard enough they could literally change the face of the planet and kill millions of people... Or worse?
On a related note: What effect would Avistan suddenly disappearing have on the rest of the planet?
Heh.
Oh, sorry, this is a place to ask Mark stuff.
*ahem*
Heh?
Yes, indeed heh.
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Hi Mark!
I have questions about serveral occult class.Mindblade is one of magus archetypes in OA.
MindBlade can create a melee weapon of her choice using psychic energy.In PFS, If one of players got a chronicle which allow her to buy a non-magical timeworn technological melee weapon with serveral charges, was she able to create that technological weapon as her psychic weapon ?And Battle Host, archetype of Occultist,can gain a weapon or a armor at 1st level. If a player got a chronicle which allow her to buy a non-magical timeworn technological weapon with serveral charges, was she able to just gain a level of battle host and get that weapon?
Remember that technological gear rules are in the Campaign Setting line and are an optional added genre component, so I wouldn't expect to see them referenced specifically in the negative in non-tech rules. What this means for someone using them is that the rules are never going to say "and also non-tech" when they say "nonmagical" somewhere, but practically, they're almost always going to mean it. If you treat, technological as its own category that is by default not allowed unless called out specifically, you'll probably make the most solid adjudication much if not all of the time.
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Hi Mark!
You mentioned that part of your Karzoug tactics involved using undead anatomy IV to assume the form of an incoporeal undead. Which undead do you favor taking the form of when using undead anatomy IV?
It probably doesn't matter a great deal since they all give you the main attractions (immunity, stacking mind-affecting +8, incorporeality), but I recommend picking one that has lifesense like wraith.
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Mr. Mark Seifter,
If a player asked to play an Occultist, but instead of normal implements, they asked if the character could use parts of their body as their implements would you allow it?
I ask because I have this idea for a character who is undergoing the Hive corruption and channels his psychic magic through his newly mutated parts. For instance using Living Armor as an abjuration implement and Living Weapon for a transmutation implement.
That sounds like it should probably be a homebrewed archetype with low rules impact that mentions that it uses tattoos, body transformation, or the like to create living implements (overall the advantages of not needing vulnerable objects is greater than the opportunity cost of being unable to share resonances, so maybe take away something small and unobtrusive).
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Mr. Mark Seifter,
In your estimation which archetype of spiritualist would best represent a character who is half-ghost? (Or maybe normal spiritualist?)
Probably one that doesn't have a separate phantom, like ectoplasmatist or exciter. Add in the fractured mind archetype to use Cha (like a ghost normally would) for added thematics. You could also just go classic and say the phantom is your ghost half, and you're at one with yourself when it's in your head but you split into your two component parts (ghost half and mortal half) when you manifest it.
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Questions about working at Paizo:
1. Who's the nicest person you work with? Why?
2. Who smells the best?
3. Who sings in the office (there is always one)? Are they good?
4. Who has the most pictures of family?
5. Does anyone say those horrible, awful, cheesy office phrases, like "somebody has a case of the Mondays", "working hard or hardly working", or worst of all, "are we having fun yet?"
6. Do you guys have those corporate motivational posters? You know the ones I'm talking about. There's something scenic and a word like "persistence" and like...a balloon on a mountain too or something like that.
7. Who has a cool voice? Like "this person should do narration" or something.
8. How is the coffee?
1) I normally wouldn't answer this, but of the designers, it would pretty clearly be Logan just because Stephen would probably take out his knife if I said he's a "nice guy"; I mean he's an antipaladin! Of the whole office, probably Linda.
2) I don't usually smell officemates, so I'm not in a good position to figure that out. Maybe Linda?
3) Linda sang in the office one time, but she closed the door first, and it was when John and Tonya both weren't in.
4) I actually haven't counted family pictures overall. Looking around my office, I didn't see any. Game design isn't really a good career economics-wise for someone who wants to start a family, so it would be siblings or parents for most of us.
5) There's more likey to be puns, including from me, though Scott Keim has more puns. I think if someone used that kind of phrase, it would be most likely to be Erik at a meeting using it semi-sarcastically, but not really any of the three listed.
6) No
7) I dunno, there's a lot of GMs, some of whom have quite a range of vocal talent. Paizo could probably do voice-acting and have it come out well. Extra recognition for John Compton's impressions, which is more in the vein of affected voices rather than natural.
8) I almost never drink coffee (once or twice at events where I was falling asleep, needed to stay awake, and there was no tea, but not since moving here).
In the exciter archetype for the spiritualist it's referencing the bloodrage instead of rage, any particular reason for this? I find it odd that it's not referencing a core mechanic when it easily could.
I'm not even sure. I think maybe that was how the freelancer concepted it and then we just didn't think of that.
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Mark how do spells that boost skill checks work with checks that are delayed such as with linguistics forgery checks.The Linguistics check is made secretly, so that you're not sure how good your forgery is. As with Disguise, you don't make a check until someone examines the work.What happens with spells that boost skill checks whose duration expires between when the forgery is made and when the check is made?
Can instantaneous spells be used to boost these checks, such as burst of insight? If so when is the spell cast? At forgery creation or much later when the check is made? If it is much later, do you have to know the check is being made in order to use burst of insight?
Would bonuses apply to every time that forgery is examined or just the first time, or just during the duration of the spell?
I'd run it like Squiggit where for a forgery there's (at least metaphorically, you could still physically adjudicate it by waiting and then rolling) a secret GM roll at the time that you only find out about when it's tested later, at least in terms of which bonuses apply. Disguise is a little more of a mixed bag because there's more to it than the prep (and it's covered at least a bit in Skills in Conflict in Ultimate Intrigue), whereas forgery you kind of write it and then you're done and it's written.
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HI Mark, I want to make a higher level Haste Spell with 3 changes
the spell level would increase to 5th level the spell duration would increase to either minutes per level or Hours per level and in the text of the spell would change from a full attack action to an attack action
the rest of the spell would remain the same.for a level 5 spell do you think that would be too powerful? What spell level do think would be right for the spell with the above changes?
Haste is a pretty dangerous spell to play around with because it's already a huge game-changer. People would be still casting it ubiquitously at 4th level if that's when they got it (as the prevalence of the generally-slightly-less-effective level 4 blessing of fervor shows). Thus, you would want to avoid giving out a haste or near-haste for hours per level, as that just more-or-less becomes constant unless an enemy comes around and spends its turn dispelling it. That said, the idea of making it so you get two attacks when explicitly using the attack action could be an interesting twist, though there's now been enough abilities built around the attack action balanced around single attacks that you might want to make it a new standard action where you attack twice, whatever spell level you use.
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HI Mark, same questions
1 Can Hunter let Animal Companion choose Skirmisher's Hunter's Tricks "Bolster Companion"?
2 Can Hunter choose feat “Monstrous Mount”？
1) It probably wouldn't be too helpful unless it also had an animal companion (perhaps possible with the right feats with a GM friendly to the idea of the recursion).
2) Animal companion is not one of the listed prereqs, so hunters and druids don't seem to qualify.
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Hi Mark, one question about slow-firing technological heavy weapon and Gunslinger's Dead shot deed.Are they compatible?
An 11th techslinger can treat heavy weapons as firearms to perform deeds. In most situations, heavy weapons are worse than a pistol for it can not be used to make iterative attacks.Slow Firing wrote:
Slow-Firing: A slow-firing weapon requires a full-round action to use, and thus cannot be used to make iterative attacks.
Dead Shot wrote:
Dead Shot (Ex): At 7th level, as a full-round action, the gunslinger can take careful aim and pool all of her attack potential into a single, deadly shot.
It seems like "all your attack potential" in that case is one attack, since it takes a full-round action to shoot once.
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Hi Mark, hope you're doing well!
I was wondering if I could get your take on a question - Phase Locking weapons affect their targets "as though" by the Dimensional Anchor spell. Does Phase Locking weapons check for Spell Resistance?
I can see this both ways, due to the use of "as though" but I would tend to run it like TOZ suggests simply because if you don't, the property's CL of 7 isn't going to be capable of doing its job by the time you buy the weapon against anything with SR (such as outsiders with at-will greater teleport, one of the #1 reasons you would buy the weapon).
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Since the Mythic Paths are pretty much based off an ability score and classes that correlate with them,if material were to be created for Occult classes, would it be better to expand the 1'st tier base abilities (Champion's Strike, Archmage Arcana, and so on) and add new path abilities to the current mythic paths or would it be better to created completely new paths for each occult class ?
It probably would make more sense to add occult-friendly mythic path abilities to the current paths, simply because that's more likely to satisfy a particular occult character than trying to make a path that's one-size-fits-all for all of the occult classes.
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Got another question for you, as this recently came up for... loud discussion at my table*. (*Virtual, but there were a lot of conflicting ideas.) Does the Warpriest Favored Class Bonus for Humans give just a Plain Combat Feat or is it referencing the Warpriest Bonus Feat Class Feature? In which case, in accordance to the Errata of FCB in Occult, would you only be able to take it starting at level 3? And on archetypes that replace the Bonus Feats, such as Sacred Fist which loses all but the 15th level bonus feat, would they have to wait until 15th level to take it?
I don't think there's a generic rules term of "bonus combat feat" to use, so it would presumably refer to the warpriest's bonus feats. I'm not really sure about how it would work with the FCB ruling in Occult because I've never been particularly clear about that one ever since the first time it was in a FAQ before I was here (also, oddly, the FCB section of Occult, while extremely short, is the only two pages of the book I didn't develop in some way; I was out sick and sent in my contribution from home).
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In regards to this FAQ and various kineticist abilities, does that mean that the feat Weapon Specialization won't actually work with a kinetic blast? More specifically, an Elemental Annihilator's Devastating Infusion, since the Annihilator has the option of choosing that feat as one of his/her bonus feats. It would be strange if they could choose the feat but couldn't actually use it.
That should be fine. It's a "feat like Weapon Focus and Improved Critical".
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The fearmonger Antipaladin archetype loses touch of corruption but keeps cruelties. Cruelties are useless without the touch though.
Do you know what was intended with this archetype?
http://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/alternate-classes/antipaladin/archetypes/pa izo---antipaladin-archetypes/fearmonger-antipaladin-archetype
Yeah, that's pretty weird. It's from just before I was really working on books (I was here, but they were already on copyfitting by then). Maybe you can touch them and just do the cruelty without damage? It doesn't seem like you could adjudicate that without a significant amount of homebrewing it though.
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Why is the caster level of a pearl of power 17? How is a 2nd-level wizard who finds one supposed to identify it?
Gisher shows the FAQ for creating one, but it's still the case that the default for a found pearl of any type is CL 17. This is ridiculous enough to be an ongoing gag in our home games. "I couldn't identify the pearl, so it must be a pearl of power again. Someone use UMD to activate it blindly to try to recall spells of various spell levels and see if it works."
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This week is a lengthy FAQ indeed!
...Hello, Mark,
Is there a way to have all the FAQs listed in chronological order ?
I wish to stay up to date with them but after some hiatus, the only way I could do that was to peruse your thread looking specifically for the FAQ posts and it takes a long lot of time, as well as the risk of missing one.
Thank you very much for all you bring to our game and community.
Right now, they're in alphabetical order by the topic within each book, but you could look at all posts by the "Pathfinder Design Team" account, as they are usually FAQ posts, as CBDunkerson linked.
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for kineticist in a home game, would making a basic acid blast cause any issues?
I am reflavoring wood to be coral and want to be able to stay in just one element...and corals do this cool thing where they throw their stomachs on neighboring corals, the first one to be digested loses.
Thanks for making this cool class, ive yet to play but I am already excited to try it out.
You're going to need to do some additional side work if you want to support it, but overall, giving wood a second blast of some sort makes sense. Remember to make a composite for yourself as well.
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I'm wondering if the Devs have stepped back on answering questions like these? Or if life is just busy right now. No problem either way. Just was wondering if we could get some clarification or not. If not, I'll just go with the the Rules Forum (Where these questions have been asked several times with no definitive answer and both sides claiming their side is the common sense one.).
Thank you though for any and all insight you have given in the past and possibly future.
Since Mark's posts here are entirely unofficial, I don't think you need to worry about delays in replies.
Best assumption: Mark is busy, probably with Starfinder stuff.
Second-best assumption: Mark has taken some time off.
Third-best assumption: Mark's a bit poorly after con season.
Fourth-best assumption: Someone did something to annoy Mark and he's stepped away from the forums for a bit to recover his equanimity.At times I feel I'm abusing the fact they are here and willing to answer. That and some of the other Devs have started turning away from answering rules questions.
But back on topic:
Mark, if you were stranded on a desert island, who from Paizo would you rather be stuck with? (And should we blame Cosmo for you getting stranded there?)
I would rather be stuck with Linda, for sure. I think it would be safe to blame Cosmo for getting us stranded there in most cases, or maybe Delta Airlines, since they are currently in the lead for stranding Paizo staff.
For the purposes of calculating starting age what category to psychics fall into?
Intuitive, self taught or trained?
Or does it depend on the discipline? Lore perhaps being trained while self perfection would be self taught and rebirth could be intuitive?
It's an interesting question. While they're spontaneous casters, we can see from Rivani's backstory that she was trained extensively, like a wizard, but she's lore. I'd go with basing it on the discipline, as you suggest, though probably no faster than self-taught.
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And since it's been a while, and I'm not sure if I ever actually asked...
Coffee or tea?
Coke or Pepsi?
Boxers or briefs?
What's the best Star Wars movie?
Favourite alcoholic beverage?
Favourite pizza?
Funniest thing that happened in the last 24 hours?
Tea.
Neither.
Either way, or boxer-briefs.
The Empire Strikes Back
Non-alcoholic cape codder.
Generally some combination of additional sorts of cheese, onions, peppers, tomatoes, garlic, and basil.
I didn't really remember so I decided to check my chat log for instances of laughter onomatopoeia. The only one I found for this past 24 hour period was that there wound up being a card in Mummy's Mask that was named as the Handmaiden of <Linda's PFS Character from Osirion>, but now that I think of it, maybe she had just used a list of common Osirian names and so did the AP, so I guess it wasn't that funny.
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Non rules but still Paizo related:
What do you think of the team separation between types of books? Like do you think it's good/bad/weird/etc. that PDT doesn't really have any authority or influence over PPC or PCS books?
From the outside it seems strange that a good two thirds of the game's rulebooks don't have any consideration or ability to be revised by the design team, despite them all potentially being pretty crunch heavy, but you never get the whole picture when you're jut looking in from the outside.
I would say that philosophically I agree with you that it's weird, and it does lead to some odd situations, but from a fundamental sense of scheduling and creating products (not to mention, as you say, the team separation), it just isn't possible for the PDT to oversee all the rules in every product, and once we're at that point, it would be a problem (and an interdepartmental faux pas) for the PDT to have authority over the product we didn't work on, rather than the actual developer of that product (and with different developers on different books, there will be differences there as well). Practically, one way to look at it is concentric rings of rules, where the RPG line is for the core setting neutral stuff (with the design team as custodians) and then the other books are in the next ring; they're each little treasure troves of ideas to use when you're playing in Golarion in a matching setting, each one its own little island. While the RPG line theoretically will take into account everything else that came before in that line (a task that becomes more and more challenging as we go along), the PComps and Campaign Settings are written to be the best they can be for their given island-niche. Then you can pick and choose which of them you want to use to reinforce a particular theme. For instance, when I was playing in Owen's Giantslayer game, he told us to use Giantslayer's Handbook and up to one other Player Companion when building our characters.
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S-... sorry! O.o
Don't worry, it wasn't your question that slowed me down. It's almost never going to be the more whimsical or personal preference questions; they're much easier to answer, even when they're long!
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Mark it seems as if we need an in depth blog on stealth. I know the rules were updated/clarified in Ultimate Intrigue, but there is still a lot of confusion.
How can the community specifically ask for a blog similar to the blog on poison, which has examples for people to go by?
I am opposed to asking specific questions, because it will lead to another question, which might take months or longer to get an answer, and it probably better to just handle it(as much as possible) all in one go.
I am overall enchanted by the idea of blogs that handle complex issues with many subquestions, but as the guy who got excited and drafted roughs for several different blog topics in March 2015, I can tell you that you might be more likely to get results, albeit incremental as you say, from specific questions. The trouble is that blogs are long and have a lot of decision/discussion points, so vetting them through the FAQ approval process is challenging, even when I provide a draft, since it takes so much time from everyone involved, and time that their schedules may not allow, even if I can shave off a half-hour for a single question FAQ.
All that said, for ease of reference and explanation, I prefer blogs as well when the situation calls for them.
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That's an impressive "catch-up effort". Nice one. :)
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Can grappling infusion be put on Singularity?
Technically, grappling specifies all the forms that can match with it, but singularity shares quite a lot of similarities with the ones on that list. I'd tend to allow it in a home game.
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The crit negation depends heavily on the game and type of enemies you meet. I can assure you that in Giantslayer, it´s one of the best defenses and blessings you can get, because once a giant crits you, you´re pulp.
Question to Mark:
The new PrC player companion is awesome, but i noticed one thing. Most/all DC´s of special abilities say 10+class level+stat mod. The way i read this class level refers to PrC class level here, because it´s not character level? Aren´t those DC´s a bit terribly low?
Considering most PrC´s come into play at level 7 and the special abilities some levels later often, DC´s are often likely to be 10+3+6 (assuming an invested optimized stat mod here)=19, while a good save on level 9 is supposed to be 12. This makes for a rough 60% to save.
Now, often the stat mods are from "secondary" stats for PrC´s though, which leads to lower mods and lower DC´s, say a 16. That´s close to a 25% chance on a good save.
Was that the purpose?
As Chemlak mentioned, the DC starts out quite low, but it quickly catches up to speed by 4th PrC level (assuming 5 levels before you qualified) and then becomes higher than expected (assuming the key ability score is your top one, not a safe assumption for assassin in particular but not related to PrC formula) all the way to 20th. This isn't great, but using 1/2 total HD or class level is more problematic (in that it doesn't reward levels in the PrC; you can dip 1 level in the PrC and have the same DC as the character who took all 10 levels in it). While an inelegant kluge, the cleanest houserule for smooth 1/2 level scaling would be DC 10 + 1/2 * (minimum level to qualify + PrC level + any class levels in other classes you take after maxing out the PrC) + stat modifier. Even then, though, perhaps it could just be something special for PrCs to have DCs normally reserved for level 20 characters at level 15 and be "ahead" for a few levels, like a mini-added capstone.
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I think my question may have gotten buried in other discussions, but regarding Vigilante talents. Do you need to meet Power Attack requirements to take Shield of Blades / can you use the feat? Similarly for Favored Maneuver?
Thanks Mark! Hope things are going well out there.
Patience, your first ask is 5 or so questions down from the last one I answered. ;) Things are going pretty well up here. Hopefully the same in Boston as well!