Goblin Squad Member
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This is a post that will hopefully come up in the inevitable searches about keywords and gear not just granting stats outright.
The basic idea: Keywords are lonely and they want their friend.
Feats and expendables have keywords they try to match to a certain piece of gear (weapon feats to weapon, expendables to feature feat, utilities to boot/glove) and the more words that match the better affect you get. If you're wearing super awesome +5 1/2 Armor of Win but the keywords in your armor feat don't match the keywords on your armor, you get very little of what the armor could do for you because that feat can't use what the armor offers it.
Feats
The higher you train a feat the more keywords it can use so you can potentially get more from it (the more + on weapons and armor the more keywords they offer). The longsword skill Slash 1 can only apply one keyword to your attack, but Slash 3 has the ability to apply three keywords to your attack to do more damage... if your longsword offers three matching keywords.
Gear
A starter longsword is +0. At that level it only has one keyword (Slashing). The longsword attack Slash 1 looks for that keyword so it will match and add damage to your attack. Slash 3 could have matched two additional keywords to add even more damage; but since the sword doesn't have them that potential is wasted, and each attack comes out with the same damage as Slash 1.
A +2 longsword has three keywords (Slashing)(Sharp)(Balanced) and the Slash feat looks for all of them. Slash 1 only has the ability to apply one keyword to its attack so the other two keywords on the +2 longsword are wasted. Slash 3 can apply three keywords to damage so the full potential of the +2 sword is realized. Slash 6 can apply six keywords, but since the +2 sword only has three keywords, you guessed it, Slash 6 does the same damage as Slash 3 with that sword and the feat's extra potential is lost.
If you manage to get a longsword +5, congrats!, Slash 6 is the only rank of that feat than can use all six keywords on your very fancy +5 longsword.
Wrong Keywords
Let's say you're using the Dragoon armor feat that looks for the keywords (Heavy)(Martial)(Distributed)(Dense) and you're wearing (I'm making this armor up for example) +2 Crusader's Plate that offers (Heavy)(Blessed)(Wrathful) which are three keywords but two of them don't match the feat so they aren't going to activate. Only one of the keywords on the armor matches the keywords of the feat, so the rest give no benefit. You'd get an identical result from +0 Crusader's Plate that offers only (Heavy). If you trade that armor to a cleric for +2 Dwarven Plate that gives keywords (Heavy)(Martial)(Distributed) you're now matching all three available keywords and getting the most out of your armor!
There's More!?
Yes, there's more about different tiers of gear and major and minor keywords, but that is the 102 class. For now shouldn't you be checking all your stuff with the feats you've been using?
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Goblin Squad Member
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> implements to feature feat
One small nitpick: implements don't have keywords. The keywords on your expendable feat look for matches in the keywords on your role feature feat; this is only example I'm aware of where feats match keywords against other feats instead of against gear.
The gear in this mechanic, the implement, just limits how many levels of expendables can be slotted and what the max level of each one can be.
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Goblin Squad Member
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This is a conversation between Stephen Cheney and myself on the Alpha forums.
#1 - Are there specific keywords that are considered Minor and Major? Or is it like I was told, the first 4 are all minor, and the last 2 that matches are considered major?
Within a particular set of keywords (weapon, gear, armor, implement), a keyword is always minor or major (aka basic or advanced; one of these days we should do a full terminology pass to standardize terms in different places). Well, except that implements only have one kind of keyword (which is about a third better than a minor).
Across sets, they might mean different things. Adamantine is a major keyword for armor; you don't get adamantine armor until Tier 3 and it is awesome. It's a minor keyword for weapons, because it's just a material type like Cold Iron or Silver, not something that gets called by T3 attacks.
For weapons, the major keywords are:
* Masterwork
* Artifact
* Extraplanar
* Intelligent
* Disrupting
* Unstoppable
* Avatar
* Living
* Hasted
* Slaying
* Avenger
* Vorpal
For armor they are:
* Masterwork
* Dragonskin
* Empowered
* Celestial
* Fiendish
* Crystal
* Ghostwood
* Adamantine
* Sage
* Shadowskin
* Truesilver
* Eldritch
For gear (generally on boots and gloves for utilities) they are:
* Masterwork
* Otherworldly
* Superior
* Unfettered
Anything else is a minor keyword.
Note that Masterwork is always a major keyword, and all items that use keywords tend to get it at T2 and T3. The other major keywords don't show up until T3.
#2 - Are there any other effects for matching more than 6 keywords?
You become a nice, helpful person that submits a bug to inform us that something that should be capped is ignoring the cap smile .
The opportunities for weapon attacks to match more than 4 minor and 2 major should be virtually nonexistent (the only way for it to happen would be for a weapon to have both a regular T3 keyword and the mysterious Artifact keyword, which isn't intended to happen). They're slightly more likely to happen with armor, though not until the highest levels, but armor should be capped to four minor and two major. Expendables can match up to 9, because their keywords are weird.
#3 - Do you have to match the initial keyword (Heavy, Light, Medium for armor, Divine, Arcane, Slashing for weapons) to be able to match anymore keywords? Or for instances can I have Heavy/Distributed/Strengthened, and be wearing Medium armor, and still get the later two keywords matching with my armor feat?
All keywords are matched independently. For example, if you're wearing completely the wrong set of T2 armor with your high-level armor feat, you're still matching Masterwork because everything gets Masterwork at T2.
#4 - Like the above question about matching before I can use said armor. When it comes to T2 armor, do I have to match the masterwork keyword before I can utilize the bump in defense? Or will the proficiency for T2 armor be enough?
We've asked for the defense increase to just be based on having the proficiency. However, proficiencies don't currently work like other feats and may be invisible to the combat system. So we may have to tie the armor defense increase to matching the keywords. We'll let you know at some point after Cole has a chance to come up for air and look at the feature request.
#5 - Could we have a list of keywords? If there is a difference between major/minor can those be named?
Sure. Adding it to the official wiki data page (for now, just the stuff that's currently available on implemented feats and items). You may have to wait for Nihimon or Decius to package it for you. Let the list above tide you over for the time being.
#6 - Does enchanting allow you to add two more Keywords? Or is enchanting essentially adding special abilities, buffs, or the like?
For weapons and armor, enchanting adds keywords (which magic item feats will activate, and certain attacks may look for). For misc gear, it adds special abilities or passive bonuses.
#7 - We have been told that Armor Feats that match key words get the listed bonus (hp, power, def bump) x1 for minor, x4 for major, just like matching weapons/abilities get a similar increase to damage, what happens when you match keywords from your implement to your expendable? How about when you match a keyword from your Boots/Belts to your utilities?
Technically, you match keywords from your role feature to your expendable. Those are special, because we wanted to stay within the 9 level format and 12 didn't divide completely evenly into 9. So each matched expendable keyword adds +7 damage and +1.4 effect power (rounded down). So a 9th level expendable adds a total of 63 damage and 12 effect power (so the same effect power as a maxed out attack and +3 damage… because integers).
Utilities match their major keywords from the appropriate boot or glove (e.g., Charge only cares what's on your boots, and ignores what's on your glove), but share the minor keywords from the rest of your gear (e.g., the keyword on your belt will apply to boot or glove utilities if they're looking for it). Their damage and effect power per keyword work exactly like attacks.
#8 - What other types of keywords to you intend to implement? Do you intend for each keyword to do something special eventually? Like Having the Dense Keyword increases your encumbrance, or the Agile keyword decrease your encumbrance?
That's two questions, so I'm just going to answer the second one because it's too early to talk about the first one anyway smile .
Nope, as Ryan says, keywords are essentially a matching system flavored by words to make it more clear what should use what. They could be Keyword1, Keyword2, Keyword3, etc. as far as the system is concerned. If you want your keyword to do something, you need to have a feat that's looking for it, it doesn't have any innate effect by just sitting on your equipped gear. Long term, there might be feats that look for such things on your armor to activate something, as we're very interested in moving anything that can use keywords to use keywords rather than having passive bonuses on gear, but we're not there yet.
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Goblin Squad Member
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> implements to feature feat
One small nitpick: implements don't have keywords. The keywords on your expendable feat look for matches in the keywords on your role feature feat
Good catch, fixed it.
The difficult part, is we need to look at someones chart to see what each feat even does... or what key words it will work with, atm. Lets hope that gets solved soon, so the game itself can point people in the right direction.
The original post and Xeen's reply and this reply are being written during alpha while tooltips are still being built and put in the game. They're scheduled to be complete in the next build in four days, (future voice) I'm sure it's much better now.
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Goblin Squad Member
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A small keyword-related UI tweak that I'd like to see: Keywords that a piece of gear doesn't have should either be not shown, or greyed out. Currently, my +0 armor shows all the keywords it could have, if it was +5. If I didn't haunt the boards (and if it hadn't been pointed out to me in game last weekend), I wouldn't necessarily know that the +#'s listed after the keywords mean that all of those keywords don't apply to my particular set of armor.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I still don't get it. I think I need a keywords for dummies version. So do I have to slot armor and weapon feats? And why do my normal armor (+0) show 3 keywords when I hover over the equipment in my bag? Are the keywords with the + only existing if I had a better version of that same armor? Why even show those keywords on the armor then? Where can I see what keywords are active and what effects they are having to my attack or defense? Is this information not available in game?
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Goblin Squad Member
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Your +0 armor can only match its first keyword, although 4 keywords are shown. The same armor in a +3 version would be able to match all or any of those 4 keywords, but the actual keyword display looks the same; you have to "just know" that the gear's + rating caps the length of the keyword list. This is a misfeature of the current item keyword GUI.
You do have to slot an armor feat on your paperdoll in order to benefit from the keywords on your armor. You don't have to slot a "weapon feat" on your paperdoll- rather, the attacks that your slot onto your hotbar are the weapon feats.
So: keywords on your weapon attacks match against keywords on your equipped weapon. Keywords on your slotted armor feat match against keywords on your equipped armor. The GUI for all of this is not terribly helpful yet but will get much better.
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Goblin Squad Member
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It would be very cool if keywords on attacks lit-up in response to equipped gear so that we would know (even before slotting or buying the attack so we could just slide down our list of availability) that it was a good match. Or some such visual cue that we are doing it right.
ps. A dev video would probably go a long way to clearing this up. Not just talking, but pointing at the screen that we would see and showing where each set of keywords play the match game.
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Goblin Squad Member
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One big problem with armor feats: Right now they don't show you their keyword list in game. To find out whether the feats on your suit of armor match your slotted armor feat, you need an out of game spreadsheet. Hopefully the UI improvements in Alpha 8 will solve some of these problems.
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Goblin Squad Member
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So do I have to slot armor and weapon feats?
Yes. Weapon Feats are actually known as Attack Feats, and they're broken down into Physical Attacks, Cantrips, and Orisons. You can slot 3 Primary and 3 Secondary Attack Feats. These are the Attacks that go into the Attack Slots on your Action Bar and activated by pressing 1 through 6. You can only slot one Armor Feat at a time.
So, your Attacks look for Keywords on your Weapon. Here's an example:
Blinding Pattern:
- Rank 1 - Arcane
- Rank 2 - Mental
- Rank 3 - Expansive
- Rank 4 - Masterwork
- Rank 5 - Telepathic
- Rank 6 - Intelligent & Artifact
Burning Flume:
- Rank 1 - Arcane
- Rank 2 - Volatile
- Rank 3 - Expansive
- Rank 4 - Masterwork
- Rank 5 - Explosive
- Rank 6 - Extraplanar & Artifact
The Arcane Keyword is present on all Rank 1 Cantrips. The Rank 2 Keyword seems to be related to which "Arcane School" the spell would likely have in PFRPG. The Rank 3 Keyword seems to alternate between Expansive for Staff Attacks, and Direct for Wand Attacks. The Rank 4 Keyword is always Masterwork. The Rank 5 Keyword seems to be another related to the spell school. And finally the Rank 6 Keyword seems related to the spell school again, and also adds the Artifact Keyword.
Now let's look at some actual Staffs:
Apprentices Charged Staff (Tier 1) (the +0 version of this is the starter version that drops off mobs):
- +0 - Arcane
- +1 - Volatile
- +2 - Expansive
- +3 - Explosive
Magister's Charged Staff (Tier 3):
- Inherent Tier 2 - Masterwork
- Inherent Tier 3 - Extraplanar
- +0 - Arcane
- +1 - Volatile
- +2 - Expansive
- +3 - Explosive
Adept's Psychic Staff (Tier 2):
- Inherent Tier 2 - Masterwork
- +0 - Arcane
- +1 - Mental
- +2 - Expansive
- +3 - Telepathic
The first thing to notice is that both of the Charged Staffs have the exact same Keyword Progression from +0 to +3, that being Arcane -> Volatile -> Expansive -> Explosive. Every variation of Psychic Staff also has a consistent Keyword Progression of Arcane -> Mental -> Expansive -> Telepathic.
Let's say you have Blinding Pattern at Rank 4 and you're trying to figure out whether to use a Magister's Charged Staff +5 or an Adept's Psychic Staff +2. Most folks would probably jump at the chance to get a Tier 3 +5 Weapon rather than a Tier 2 +2 Weapon, but you've been paying attention and asking questions so you know better :)
Your Blinding Pattern Rank 4 matches Keywords with the Magister's Charged Staff +5 for Arcane, Expansive, and Masterwork. Since it matches the Tier 2 Keyword Masterwork, but doesn't match the Tier 3 Keyword Extraplanar (you'd need Blinding Pattern 6 to match that one), you'll only get the middle roll of the 3d200. The total of three matched Keywords means your Base Damage will be about 19% higher.
Your Blinding Pattern Rank 4 matches Keywords with the Adept's Psychic Staff + 2 for Arcane, Mental, Expansive, and Masterwork. Since it matches the Tier 2 Keyword Masterwork, you'll get the middle roll of the 3d200 (same as above!). But your total of four matched Keywords means your Base Damage will be about 25% higher (even better than a Tier 3 +5!)
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Goblin Squad Member
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A note on the above, I may be misinterpreting something because it looks like there would be no difference between a Tier 3 +3 and a Tier 3 +5 Weapon, and that doesn't seem right.
There's a good chance you need the +3 to match the Tier 2 Keyword, and the +5 to match the Tier 3 Keyword.
You know, I may have been thinking to hard on this. I was thinking that all these words had different effects. But all they are is simple damage boosters. That makes it easier but its also a little disappointing.
Is that true? That is kind of disappointing.
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Goblin Squad Member
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This is a conversation between Stephen Cheney and Cheatle for TEO on the Alpha forums.
#2 - Are there any other effects for matching more than 6 keywords?
You become a nice, helpful person that submits a bug to inform us that something that should be capped is ignoring the cap smile .The opportunities for weapon attacks to match more than 4 minor and 2 major should be virtually nonexistent (the only way for it to happen would be for a weapon to have both a regular T3 keyword and the mysterious Artifact keyword, which isn't intended to happen). They're slightly more likely to happen with armor, though not until the highest levels, but armor should be capped to four minor and two major. Expendables can match up to 9, because their keywords are weird.
The cleric armor feats add two major key words at T3 and another at level 14 (total 9):
Healer 14 Celestial, Fiendish, Truesilver, Masterwork, Medium, Blessed, Supple, Flexible, QuietThe feat supports Celestial and Fiendish, but A cleric is now or the other based upon channel energy choice which is driven by alignment and God choice.
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Goblinworks Game Designer
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A note on the above, I may be misinterpreting something because it looks like there would be no difference between a Tier 3 +3 and a Tier 3 +5 Weapon, and that doesn't seem right.
There's a good chance you need the +3 to match the Tier 2 Keyword, and the +5 to match the Tier 3 Keyword.
+4 and +5 are reserved for extra keywords from the not-yet-implemented customizable keyword system. Presently, they're identical to +3 for keyword-using items (armor and weapons). For things like consumables, that scale their bonus directly to +, +4 and +5 will make a difference.
Items do not have to be +4 or +5 to gain their innate keywords. You can have a +0 Tier 3 item that just has the base keyword and the innate keywords, but is lacking the upgrade keywords.