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Scorpion Whips: How do scorpion whips work? There are several published sources of scorpion whips, and they seem inconsistent.
Change the last sentence in the Ultimate Combat scorpion whip's description to say "If you are proficient with both scorpion whips and whips, you can use a scorpion whip in either the normal way, as a typical light performance weapon, or as a whip. When you use a scorpion whip as a whip, it is otherwise equivalent to a whip, but it deals lethal damage and can harm creatures regardless of their armor bonus." This change will be reflected in future errata.What this means is that the scorpion whip is normally a light performance weapon with no other special weapon features, but that someone with both proficiencies can also use it as a whip, in which case it acts precisely like a whip in all ways (one-handed weapon, attack out to 15 feet, provoke an attack of opportunity, can use the Whip Mastery feats, etc) except that it deals lethal damage and can harm creatures regardless of their armor bonus.
Scorpion whip has finally been whipped into shape, leaving Light and Darkness significantly in 1st place while another question on Light and Darkness is also 4th place and only a few clicks away from 2nd, simultaneously. Will that mean that a Light and Darkness FAQ blog is possible in future? Will the fact that only Thursday apparently has an open blog spot mean that it's on Thursday? Find out on the next exciting episode of FAQ Friday, which, who knows, could be on Thursday!
Did you know that when different wizards make the same potion, that they taste exactly the same?But only if the wizards are of equal experience and power. Otherwise, the more powerful wizard's potion will taste more bland and generic, making it harder to tell what it is.
I guess this means that there's a certain flavor to each spell, but then a separate (and stronger) flavor to the essence of magical power itself. The more magical power in your potion, the stronger the magic-taste, which overpowers the taste of the individual spell. So with a powerful enough potion, you mostly just taste MAGIIIIC!!! and have to have a pretty discerning palate in order to detect anything else.
So... what you're saying is... that the Wizard goes back into his 'secret lab', grabs an empty bottle and fills it with his 'magical liquid essence', puts a cork in it and sells it to me for gold. Then at some point, I pop the cork off and dump this bottled goo that comes straight from the *ahem* wizard's 'source of power' down my throat and receive some magical effect for a short time.
It makes what Severus Snape does down in his dungeon in Hogwarts all the more disturbing.
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Hey Mark, I idolize you so I wanted to ask you for advice. I've seen you bring up good house rules and DMing opinions in the past, so I'm curious what your thoughts on this are:
I'm running a solo-campaign for an Arcane Trickster. Heavy on the caster, light on the "martial"-aspect of Rogue. So far, non-combat scenarios have been fine. He's been quite clever with spells and hard-to-catch in the Dark Souls meets arcane Tomb Raider world.
The combats, however, have been lackluster. Either he manages to pick-off his enemies with impunity and isn't challenged or his enemies foil his plans (see invisibility, tremorsense and forced in close) and he feels a bit helpless. He's enjoyed identifying enemies source of finding him and trying to exploit it in some way, which I've enjoyed, but I'm worried I'll run out of ideas soon.
I'm considering tossing him Leadership for free and letting him run an NPC ally for in-combat control and out-of-combat GMPC to guide the game, but I'm a bit wary of taking away from the strength of stealth and elusiveness of his character by making him worry about his ally making it out of a tough fight or past traps. Plus, I'm not sure if that solves combat issues.
Any DM tips, house rules, or just cool ideas?
Contributor
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I'm a huge fan of the intended changes to the Unchained Summoner (subtypes, deeper fluff attachment, etc.). However, there are some things that are still missing.
There's a lot of subtypes that we still need - for me, the most blatant are Kyton, Qlippoth, and Genie. On top of that, there's "non-outsiders" like Fey, Plant, and Lovecraftian Horror. EDIT: Apparently everyone wants Dragons too. :)
There's some dubiousness about spells from unlisted sources - it's hard to modify Herolab in this way, so an official adjustment would be nice.
Some very important thematic evolutions weren't ported over - I'm thinking about the spell-like ability evolutions in particular. On top of that, the basic eidolon chassis choices are still locked into terrible mental stats, and the reduced evolution points make it even harder to justify purchasing Int/Cha boosts (especially at the same cost as a Str/Dex/Con increase).
Are there plans to continue supporting the new material? (I thought I'd heard that the answer was yes.)
If so, will these plans address any of my concerns?
Even if you can't tell me, does the question itself count as useful player feedback; e.g., when deciding whether you'll do so in the future?
Thank you! :)
Hi Mark! Got to say that I love a lot of the stuff in Unchained and I've been wanting something like automatic bonus progression table for a *long* time.
That being said, I'll admit that I'm a bit disappointed about the way armor and weapon abilities other than the strict plusses are handled in the system. Your blog post with capacity certainly helps a lot in terms of cost, but seems to still bind the character to investing lots of resources in specific equipment, much like before, rather than being something tied to the character.
I was considering using your table from the blog, but having the cost apply to the *character* by means of rituals of attunement rather than the cost of a specific weapon. What I mean is that a character could spend 6000 gp to apply his +1 attunement bonus to whichever +1-equivalent weapon he picks for his attunement on a given day (and only that one!), though he could switch attuned weapons between days, and spend additional gold down the line to keep up with the tables progression as he sees fit.
I was thinking of using this system for my next campaign, but being a relatively green GM (and not really a number cruncher) I thought I should check if I'm missing any glaring problems with this approach. Thoughts?
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I have a question regarding the Unchained Barbarian, actually. What's up with Spell Sunder?
It's not on the list of new Rage Powers, nor the list of allowed ones from other sources...but Sunder Enchantment is on the second despite having Spell Sunder as a prerequisite.
So...is it intended to be on that list, get revised, or what? Or is Sunder Enchantment now free of prerequisites?
Is it PFS legal for a Ninja take Rogue archetypes if they have the class features to swap out? For example, a Ninja (Scout).
They're a bit different. Fly by is even better.
Hey Mark! Here's some questions about potion tasting
Can a jerk wizard use prestidigitation to alter the flavor of a potion, so that (for 1 hour) it either cannot be identified by taste or the taste is disguised to be that of a different potion?
Could anybody pour a spicy potion into, say, a glass of milk and disguise its flavor that way?
Can magic potions be used as ingredients for making alcoholic cocktails? If so, what's your favorite?
If you taste a potion to try and determine what kind it is, is there enough potion left to drink it at some point afterwards? Or is tasting = drinking?
There's all sorts of required judgment calls in the Perception rules, and this is one of 'em. I'd probably give a circumstance penalty to the potion ID check for any of that hijinks you specify.
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Hey Mark,
I idolize you soI wanted to ask you for advice. I've seen you bring up good house rules and DMing opinions in the past, so I'm curious what your thoughts on this are:I'm running a solo-campaign for an Arcane Trickster. Heavy on the caster, light on the "martial"-aspect of Rogue. So far, non-combat scenarios have been fine. He's been quite clever with spells and hard-to-catch in the Dark Souls meets arcane Tomb Raider world.
The combats, however, have been lackluster. Either he manages to pick-off his enemies with impunity and isn't challenged or his enemies foil his plans (see invisibility, tremorsense and forced in close) and he feels a bit helpless. He's enjoyed identifying enemies source of finding him and trying to exploit it in some way, which I've enjoyed, but I'm worried I'll run out of ideas soon.
I'm considering tossing him Leadership for free and letting him run an NPC ally for in-combat control and out-of-combat GMPC to guide the game, but I'm a bit wary of taking away from the strength of stealth and elusiveness of his character by making him worry about his ally making it out of a tough fight or past traps. Plus, I'm not sure if that solves combat issues.
Any DM tips, house rules, or just cool ideas?
This is one of the most thought-provoking questions I've seen in the whole thread.
I've taken some time to think about it over the weekend, and I have some ideas:
1) You could capitalize off of his enjoyment of identifying enemies to exploit their weaknesses and take it one step further: psychology. For example, design a dungeon where the BBEG has managed, through skilled Diplomacy, to gather together a group of bad guys with pretty disparate actual goals in order to effect the BBEG's plan. An excellent published example of this is Beyond the Doomsday Door from Shattered Star (our group did something like the following through that entire adventure). With Knowledge skills, maybe recon, or some grifting and quick thinking, allow your player to catch wind of some of the seams between the motivations and exploit those seams to make unlikely allies. Basically, turn the factions of the enemies against each other and you can fight alongside members of the faction you are befriending/infiltrating until it becomes convenient to escape, strike against the weakened faction after the dust settles, etc.
2) You could consider giving him an ally, but one that not only fills in a gap but also complements his playstyle. For instance, the Jade Regent group I'm running has an extremely sneaky Life Oracle who is built to be almost as sneaky as the ninja and the rogue, so they can all sneak together. A team of specialists in different sketchy activities can work together really well for some fun plots (watch a few episodes of Leverage or the like for some inspiration!)
3) You could also focus on plots where the enemies have certain objectives, and thus where wiping out the dungeon isn't the true goal. If the enemies need to move a shipment from point A to point B, then there are plenty of ways for a tricksy PC to make sure that doesn't go down the way they want, for instance, without necessarily dropping bodies.
I'm a huge fan of the intended changes to the Unchained Summoner (subtypes, deeper fluff attachment, etc.). However, there are some things that are still missing.
There's a lot of subtypes that we still need - for me, the most blatant are Kyton, Qlippoth, and Genie. On top of that, there's "non-outsiders" like Fey, Plant, and Lovecraftian Horror. EDIT: Apparently everyone wants Dragons too. :)
There's some dubiousness about spells from unlisted sources - it's hard to modify Herolab in this way, so an official adjustment would be nice.
Some very important thematic evolutions weren't ported over - I'm thinking about the spell-like ability evolutions in particular. On top of that, the basic eidolon chassis choices are still locked into terrible mental stats, and the reduced evolution points make it even harder to justify purchasing Int/Cha boosts (especially at the same cost as a Str/Dex/Con increase).
Are there plans to continue supporting the new material? (I thought I'd heard that the answer was yes.)
If so, will these plans address any of my concerns?
Even if you can't tell me, does the question itself count as useful player feedback; e.g., when deciding whether you'll do so in the future?
Thank you! :)
Yeah, you'll probably want to go through other options from previous sources and check them (for spells, for instance, think about whether they should be a level higher than they are based on how things moved). Kytons very nearly made it in (we had a little bit of extra space, and I requested to do more subtypes), but divs beat them out barely. Genies were on the possibilities list, but Jason felt like elemental was very close already. Qlippoths want to wipe out humanity to prevent more demons from forming, and they don't have the obsession like divs, so they just seem like they would generally just refuse all of your commands.
Disconnected question: do Variant Multiclass abilities count as class features? For example, does a Hunter with the Oracle VMC have the Mystery class feature - potentially allowing access to the Divine Protection feat?
Thank you! :)
You'll have to decide if they count as class features or not in your own games; Unchained leaves that open to you. You could even do it on a case-by-case basis, like "Usually it'll be yes, but I reserve the right to say no if there's any weird interactions."
Also also - will we ever get VMC for the ACG classes? (I know they were intentionally left out, but I'd love to VMC for Swashbuckler's Finesse or Animal Teamwork.)
What about the Occult classes? I have a fire-barbarian who needs some Kinetic flavor...
Thank you! :)
Hybrids were left out for good reason, so I'm pretty sure you won't see those. I don't have much insight into what's going into the occult support books, so as to occult, could go either way as far as I know!
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Hi Mark! Got to say that I love a lot of the stuff in Unchained and I've been wanting something like automatic bonus progression table for a *long* time.
That being said, I'll admit that I'm a bit disappointed about the way armor and weapon abilities other than the strict plusses are handled in the system. Your blog post with capacity certainly helps a lot in terms of cost, but seems to still bind the character to investing lots of resources in specific equipment, much like before, rather than being something tied to the character.
I was considering using your table from the blog, but having the cost apply to the *character* by means of rituals of attunement rather than the cost of a specific weapon. What I mean is that a character could spend 6000 gp to apply his +1 attunement bonus to whichever +1-equivalent weapon he picks for his attunement on a given day (and only that one!), though he could switch attuned weapons between days, and spend additional gold down the line to keep up with the tables progression as he sees fit.
I was thinking of using this system for my next campaign, but being a relatively green GM (and not really a number cruncher) I thought I should check if I'm missing any glaring problems with this approach. Thoughts?
Yeah, you could absolutely do attunement rituals that cost gp for special abilities. I only left in the special qualities because, unlike "Ring of Protection" or "Amulet of Natural Armor," myths and legends actually do have a good amount of instances where heroes find a weapon with some wahoo ability that is intrinsic to the weapon, so I thought we might want to leave it in there. I fully approve of a variant where it's all innate though!
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I have a question regarding the Unchained Barbarian, actually. What's up with Spell Sunder?
It's not on the list of new Rage Powers, nor the list of allowed ones from other sources...but Sunder Enchantment is on the second despite having Spell Sunder as a prerequisite.
So...is it intended to be on that list, get revised, or what? Or is Sunder Enchantment now free of prerequisites?
I actually didn't work on Unchained Barbarian (I did at least a little bit of making new abilities for the others, Jason was in charge of all of them, and Logan was backup for barbarian), but I believe since 1/rage powers are gone, Logan folded a spell sundering ability as an extra freebie Witch Hunter, saving a rage power. If I'm right, that probably means that Sunder Enchantment should require Witch Hunter.
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Is it PFS legal for a Ninja take Rogue archetypes if they have the class features to swap out? For example, a Ninja (Scout).
I believe that it is currently in the realm of people not being sure and expecting table variation. In my home games, I allow it.
Hi Mark, I was just comparing Fly by Attack and Spring attack they both do the same thing for different modes of movement, why does Spring attack
take 3 feats but flyby attack only requires one feat?
Rynjin and Kalindlara are both right, except also Flyby also has bizarro wording in its short description (above the prereqs) that confuses the matter further. I think really it's a case of thinking of it as a monster ability, in which case it probably should have been a UMR instead anyway.
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Just wanted to re-ask some parts of a previous post that got missed.
1) There's some dubiousness about spells from unlisted sources - it's hard to modify Herolab in this way, so an officially adjusted list would be nice.
2) Some very important thematic evolutions weren't ported over - I'm thinking about the spell-like ability evolutions in particular. Will those be revised and added back to the unchained summoner in any official capacity?
3) On top of that, the basic eidolon chassis choices are still locked into terrible mental stats, and the reduced evolution points make it even harder to justify purchasing Int/Cha boosts (especially at the same cost as a Str/Dex/Con increase). This isn't a question, I just wanted to keep saying it.
4) Are there plans to continue supporting the new material? (I thought I'd heard that the answer was yes.)
5) If so, will these plans address any of my concerns?
6) Even if you can't tell me, does the question itself count as useful player feedback; e.g., when deciding whether you'll do so in the future?
Thank you! :)
Is it PFS legal for a Ninja take Rogue archetypes if they have the class features to swap out? For example, a Ninja (Scout).I believe that it is currently in the realm of people not being sure and expecting table variation. In my home games, I allow it.
Poking around that rabbit hole a little more I found
Archetypes
Alternate class abilities
There's also a rogue only trait (blade of the society)
The bludgeoner feat would technically not work for a ninja (thats a biggie)
The torchbearer archetype wouldn't work.
Murderer's Blackcloth wouldn't work.
I also found lunch.
Mr. Mark Seifter,
I was rereading the Greater Aspect ability of the unchained summoner. Am I reading this right? 6 points from the eidolon equals 12 points for the summoner to use for him/herself?
Mark, over in this thread about the big six, you mentioned clothing-as-armour.
It's actually in the game already:
You imbue a suit of armor or a shield with an enhancement bonus of +1 per four caster levels (maximum +5 at 20th level).
An outfit of regular clothing counts as armor that grants no AC bonus for the purpose of this spell.
Which reminds me of something I was wondering about back when I was working on a savage barbarian: does a clothing that has been enchanted, either permanently, or just with magic vestment, count as wearing armour for the purposes of class abilities?
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Mark, over in this thread about the big six, you mentioned clothing-as-armour.
Which reminds me of something I was wondering about back when I was working on a savage barbarian: does a clothing that has been enchanted, either permanently, or just with magic vestment, count as wearing armour for the purposes of class abilities?It's actually in the game already:
You imbue a suit of armor or a shield with an enhancement bonus of +1 per four caster levels (maximum +5 at 20th level).
An outfit of regular clothing counts as armor that grants no AC bonus for the purpose of this spell.
It shouldn't. There are any number of other ways to have armor bonuses - even material items that give armor bonuses - without actually making them be armor. This shouldn't be any different...
Mr. Mark Seifter,
I was rereading the Greater Aspect ability of the unchained summoner. Am I reading this right? 6 points from the eidolon equals 12 points for the summoner to use for him/herself?
I think Jason handed it over identical to the APG version and the minor wording tweak was likely editors removing passive voice. It should still be that you get 6 points and the eidolon loses 3.
Mark, over in this thread about the big six, you mentioned clothing-as-armour.
Which reminds me of something I was wondering about back when I was working on a savage barbarian: does a clothing that has been enchanted, either permanently, or just with magic vestment, count as wearing armour for the purposes of class abilities?It's actually in the game already:
You imbue a suit of armor or a shield with an enhancement bonus of +1 per four caster levels (maximum +5 at 20th level).
An outfit of regular clothing counts as armor that grants no AC bonus for the purpose of this spell.
I agree with Shisumo that it wouldn't. Mage armor is almost always a better bet, though.
I was more thinking about it as an alternative to bracers than to getting the wizard to mage armour me. A +4 tap out t-shirt (for a bro-barian), or a +2 improved fire resistant duster (for a Dresden-esque kensai) is more fun than bracers of armour.
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I was more thinking about it as an alternative to bracers than to getting the wizard to mage armour me. A +4 tap out t-shirt (for a bro-barian), or a +2 improved fire resistant duster (for a Dresden-esque kensai) is more fun than bracers of armour.
You might want to check out the gunman's duster for inspiration...
I was more thinking about it as an alternative to bracers than to getting the wizard to mage armour me. A +4 tap out t-shirt (for a bro-barian), or a +2 improved fire resistant duster (for a Dresden-esque kensai) is more fun than bracers of armour.You might want to check out the gunman's duster for inspiration...
Get one on your occultist today!
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Wondering if you could give your thoughts on this.
Is it so self-evident that Dex-replaces-Strength-in-every-way? Or do you think additional clarification is needed?
Thank you! :)
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Dear Mark: do you have a secret method (either magical, psychic, psionic, or mundane) of causing a major destructive electro-magnetic surge within the computational device of any would-be spammer?
Because that would be... sublime.
Wondering if you could give your thoughts on this.
Is it so self-evident that Dex-replaces-Strength-in-every-way? Or do you think additional clarification is needed?
Thank you! :)
I actually agree with the others; a rules element that doesn't add your Strength bonus is clearly intended not to add other alternate ability score bonuses since it was conceived and presumably balanced without such a boost. However, I do admit that the wording is not 100% tight if one was to examine it legalistically.
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Dear Mark: do you have a secret method (either magical, psychic, psionic, or mundane) of causing a major destructive electro-magnetic surge within the computational device of any would-be spammer?
Because that would be... sublime.
Nope, but I'm honored that 21 of you flagged that spammer. I guess more people read my random ramblings than I thought!
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I actually agree with the others; a rules element that doesn't add your Strength bonus is clearly intended not to add other alternate ability score bonuses since it was conceived and presumably balanced without such a boost. However, I do admit that the wording is not 100% tight if one was to examine it legalistically.Wondering if you could give your thoughts on this.
Is it so self-evident that Dex-replaces-Strength-in-every-way? Or do you think additional clarification is needed?
Thank you! :)
Thank you! :)
Mark how would you price a weapons enchantment that did the same thing as a rod of lesser metamagic?
Wouldn't that just be tacking a Metamagic rod effect onto a weapon? So, the same price as the metamagic rod (many of which can BE weapons. Rods are often light maces).
Is it true that Paladins don't need to worship deities to get their powers? Currently in an argument with someone who says they do need to in PF, but as far as I know that's only a golarion thing.
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It happened! Light and Darkness blog livesssssssss!
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I know that was a lot of work...does that mean no FAQ tomorrow? (We the people of the Paizo messageboards community are like ever hungry ravenous ghouls, eternally salivating, never satisfied, yearning for more sweet, delicious flesh FAQs.)
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I know that was a lot of work...does that mean no FAQ tomorrow? (We the people of the Paizo messageboards community are like ever hungry ravenous ghouls, eternally salivating, never satisfied, yearning for more sweet, deliciousfleshFAQs.)
That was tomorrow's FAQ today (since the blog overlords have very very few blog slots open).
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Could anybody pour a spicy potion into, say, a glass of milk and disguise its flavor that way?
Can magic potions be used as ingredients for making alcoholic cocktails? If so, what's your favorite?
This brings up a similar idea...
Does anyone know if there has been a published adventure where the big bad of a dungeon poured poisons into cure potions, and seeded them throughout the dungeon? You'd heal 1d8+1 HP, but then have to make a fort check or lose CON to ability damage. That sort of thing.
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How would you handle the vexing dodgers Limb climbing ability? As part of movement or a standard action combat maneuver?
When adjacent to or in the space of a corporeal creature at least one size category larger than herself, a vexing dodger can climb that creature's body with a successful Climb check against a DC equal to the target creature's CMD. Although the vexing dodger is holding on to the creature, this action isn't a grapple; it doesn't provoke attacks of opportunity from the creature, and neither the vexing dodger nor the creature she climbs gains the grappled condition. While the vexing dodger is on the climbed creature, the creature takes a penalty on attack rolls against the vexing dodger equal to the number of sneak attack dice the dodger possesses.
This ability replaces trapfinding.