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I'd like to put my input in as someone who uses the nerfed version in PFS play...
It's EXTREMELY powerful. Way more than some people would give it credit and I've only been hit twice in my entire carear. (I was playing lower tier and those two things were an owlbear and a BIG yeti... not exactly standard opponants) To be fair, I optimized this character for defense (MoMS included along with deflect arrows), but at times it gets ridiculous when the only thing that could hit me are things with a +20 to their attack.
Will I ever play a character with this feat chain again? No. As a GM, would I ever allow someone to use the unnerfed version of the feat? Yeah, sure, especially in higher level play... but ONLY for higher level play. I certainly would not allow MoMS abuse like I did with this character, because it just gets silly.
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NOt really, Piccolo.
The fact is, you can shut down a missile guy by running up and getting him into melee, or simply going behind cover. If you don't, he can sit there and shoot multiple arrows at you, even at low levels. Arrow Deflection is nice, but unless you're stuck in an open field, you don't need it to avoid an archer. IF you do have it...it has much less effect, because Archers get multiple attacks sooner, and more of them.
And yes, attacking someone only once a round does do less damage then full attacking them. Except you had Crane Riposte, so you automatically got an extra attack at full BAB every single round. If you have Spring Attack, for example, you get basically two attacks a round, and your enemy gets 0. His charge attack is useless unless he has Pounce. His Vital Strike is useless.
Arrow Deflection and Crane Wing are in no ways similar. Now, if Arrow Deflection worked on ranged spell attacks, maybe we could talk.
==Aelryinth
They are similar in that they both allow the deflection or reduction of a single attack. Saying they are "no ways similar" is rubbish.
What is different is how melee and ranged attacks work. There are other methods for defeating ranged attacks, not the least of which is sundering or destroying the bow. Disarming the bow. Sundering the quiver. Spells like wind wall or fickle winds. Invisibility is far more effective against a ranged attacker as well.
But both Deflect Arrow and Crane Wing did exactly the same thing mechanically by eliminating one attack. Only difference is Crane did it for melee and Arrow Deflection did it for ranged.
If you use a bow on a Crane Wing character, the deflection does nothing for him. If you used a ranged spell, it does nothing for him. Once creatures commonly have multiple attacks, it doesn't do near as much.
As far as discussions of how each character is built, that is beside the point because you would build both characters the same way without Crane Wing or Arrow Deflection.
Please don't try to sell me they aren't the same, when the deflection does exactly the same thing. There are ways to defeat both as you level. All they had to do to reduce Crane Wing a bit was write it so that it only worked against a single damaging attack, not spells.
There were other ways to reduce it without making a cool defensive martial art style lame.
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Um, medium creatures can't easily. 5ft step is a real part of the game.NOt really, Piccolo.
The fact is, you can shut down a missile guy by running up and getting him into melee,
or simply going behind cover. If you don't, he can sit there and shoot multiple arrows at you, even at low levels. Arrow Deflection is nice, but unless you're stuck in an open field, you don't need it to avoid an archer. IF you do have it...it has much less effect, because Archers get multiple attacks sooner, and more of them.Yeah, martials get multiple attacks around level 6. One level after you are supposed to get Crane Wing. Monsters can, and often do, get multiple attacks by level 1. And, mutliple melee baddies isn't too uncommon. There are ways around Deflect arrows, true, but that doesn't mean there aren't ways around Crane Wing.
You only get 2 attacks if that one attack you keep stinging him with is hurting him enough for him to prioritize you over the squishier wizard, clankier cleric, or squishier rogue in the party(or whatever equivalents you wish to have).And yes, attacking someone only once a round does do less damage then full attacking them. Except you had Crane Riposte, so you automatically got an extra attack at full BAB every single round. If you have Spring Attack, for example, you get basically two attacks a round, and your enemy gets 0. His charge attack is useless unless he has Pounce. His Vital Strike is useless.
Arrow Deflection and Crane Wing are in no ways similar. Now, if Arrow Deflection worked on ranged spell attacks, maybe we could talk.
They are similar in several ways. They both do the same thing, ignore one attack each round. Archers get around it by getting multiple attacks in a round. Melee creatures get around it by having multiple attacks in a round. Spellcasters get around both with crowd control spells and blast spells and buffs that don't target the AC and can't be deflected.
As for it in its current state:Its not as crippled as it seems. The stark contrast of now and then is off-putting, but still, its a good way for low-defense melee characters to sacrifice a small amount of offensive power(-1 or -2 isn't terrible), for a good amount of defense(+4 and +8 v. 1 attack/round is great on low-AC characters). Its obviously not winning the DPR olympics, but it still can help a low-defense character. Now, Wing itself isn't incredibly useful for super AC characters, but still its not a horrid waste of a feat if you want to guaruntee that nothing hits.
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I have a Goblin Brawler (Fighter archetype, not ACG) who uses a 2 level dip for MoMS and took Snake Style and Crane Style. After the nerf and the introduction of the ACG, I've reworked the build to drop Crane Wing and Crane Riposte and have added in Pummeling Style and Pummeling Charge - the build now uses Crane or Pummeling in most fights, and Crane is no longer a cornerstone of the build.
That's the only build out of a great many that I've found Crane Style useful in, in its current form.
Wiggz, if the character is for PFS, I think you have to rebuild again. Pummeling Charge just recently became illegal for PFS.
If it is not for PFS, disregard. =)
No idea why Paizo developers decided to nerf considering the far worse balance problems in the game.Because they wanted to make the Swashbuckler's "Parry & Riposte" look better. So instead of improving that ability, they decided to nerf CW into complete uselessness.
Same reason why they nerfed Animal Companions instead of buffing Cavaliers...
I think some whiny GMs were also crying foul because they couldn't think of "advanced" tactics such as "attack the same target twice" or "use a ranged weapon".
How did Animal Companions get nerfed?
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I have a Goblin Brawler (Fighter archetype, not ACG) who uses a 2 level dip for MoMS and took Snake Style and Crane Style. After the nerf and the introduction of the ACG, I've reworked the build to drop Crane Wing and Crane Riposte and have added in Pummeling Style and Pummeling Charge - the build now uses Crane or Pummeling in most fights, and Crane is no longer a cornerstone of the build.
That's the only build out of a great many that I've found Crane Style useful in, in its current form.
Wiggz, if the character is for PFS, I think you have to rebuild again. Pummeling Charge just recently became illegal for PFS.
If it is not for PFS, disregard. =)
Waitwaitwait. the important question is how do you have a Goblin boon? Aren't there only like... 5 in the world?
Or is this non PFS? :3
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(Sigh) Talking around the points again.
When I say Arrow Deflection and Crane Wing are in no ways similar I was referring back to the earlier point that they are equally valuable.
They are in no ways similar in value.
Sure, they are mechanically identical.
Fact: A monster can have 101 attacks. If forced to move, it has 1. Old Crane Wing shut that down. The only counter was being a hydra, or Pounce, found on what, 3 monsters?
Fact: Monsters and many NPC's only have 1 attack. Crane Wing shuts it down.
Fact: Vital Strike is completely shut down by this feat. So are all non-Pounce charges.
Fact: You shut off your opponent's best attack, and you get an AoO. Even if you are exchanging full attacks, you're going to come out +2 attacks ahead of an enemy on the exchange (-1 him, +1 you).
Fact: Even if you only get 1 attack, you get another one when the enemy attacks, so you're getting 2 attacks a round. You're fine.
Fact: If the monster ignores you, you still can get full attacks on him.
Fact: You can force a monster into only getting 1 attack on you with good tactics, which totally shuts it down.
Fact: Good tactics means he can't go after your squishies. That's what good tactics are for.
Arrow Deflection:
Fact: Arrows get full attacks far more often then melees do. Since Arrow Deflection only works against 1 arrow and the likelihood of full attacks is higher, this makes Arrow Deflection less valuable, as it won't shut down an archer.
Fact: Arrow Deflection doesn't dovetail with anything for generating an AoO for you. No deflecting an arrow and getting to shoot something back!
Fact: There's multiple ways to avoid Arrow Fire without using this feat, cover, fog and getting out of the line of fire the most prominent. This further devalues Arrow Deflection, as you have easy alternatives to needing it.
Fact: An archer firing while in melee range of opponents is triggering AoO's. A monster throwing stuff in melee is triggering AoO's. Yes, 5' steps exist. So does Reach and Step Up.
Fact: There are far far fewer monsters that use ranged attacks then those that use magical or melee attacks. Infrequency of use further devalues Arrow Deflection.
Fact: Anyone can grab Arrow Deflection with a couple levels in monk. Nobody bothers to just to get it. If you got the Crane Wing parry, they'd do so. Oh, right, MoMS allows just that, guess what they did?
Fact: People talk with their builds. And their builds empirically state that the Crane Wing Parry is far, far more valuable and useful then Arrow Deflection, and any attempt to value them the same just doesn't work.
==Aelryinth
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Old Crane Wing was better than Deflect Arrows. I also believe it had a right to be.
Deflect arrows has pre-reqs of one stat at 13 and one feat.
Crane Wing has pre-reqs of BAB +5 or 5 Monk levels and three feats.
In my play experience, I have found both feats (pre-nerf regarding Crane Wing) to be very useful. What made Crane Wing stronger? It tended to negate hits that would individually deal larger damage, as melee attacks tend to do slightly better damage on a hit to hit basis.
If people routinely played the rocket tag scenario as you suggest, the hit exchange would still seem pretty even to me. The Crane Wing using PC would take two attacks a round (one AoO for moving away, one when his enemy moved back in to attack), one of which would get negated. They would also make one attack prior to moving.
There are also numerous factors which could change the above example, such as reach, pounce, ect. All in all though, if you are playing that game minus the ability to attack multiple times with your movement, it's going to be a long game of blah for both participants.
Fact: Mounted Combat + an animal companion (mount)that has the In Harm's Wa/Bodyguard chain still has Crane-Style level deflection /kneeslapper!\
Please nerf melees more lol :) (obviously, kidding)
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Fact: Mounted Combat + an animal companion (mount)that has the In Harm's Wa/Bodyguard chain still has Crane-Style level deflection /kneeslapper!\
Please nerf melees more lol :) (obviously, kidding)
Except then your animal companion is taking the damage, and after the first couple levels they generally have far fewer hit points. And Mounted Combat doesn't prevent that because you can only use it to prevent attacks on the mount, not yourself. So it's really a different kind of deal.
Put me in the camp of "Crane Wing was fine before, Master of Many Styles is the real problem with style feats". The solution to the Crane Wing "problem" was to ban MoMS in PFS and otherwise leave the feat alone.
@Ser Clay - I've used In Harm's Way before, and it isn't a free deflection. Your animal companion or eidolon has to take the hit for you. That's great when the hit would disable your PC or an ally and not bad when you dump some damage into the companion and then spend your turn healing it. It isn't a "free" deflection like OCW though.
That said, stealing the DM's hit with Mounted Combat is one of the great joys of the Ride skill (though that's often not an auto success either)
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It's worth noting that PFS have now banned Pummeling Charge, a feat normally only available to 8th level brawlers and monks since PFS ends before anyone else reach +12 BAB.
It's hard not to think that a MoMS dip bringing the feat chain online for anyone at level 2 instead of brawlers and monks at level 8 was a factor there as well.
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It's worth noting that PFS have now banned Pummeling Charge, a feat normally only available to 8th level brawlers and monks since PFS ends before anyone else reach +12 BAB.
It's hard not to think that a MoMS dip bringing the feat chain online at level 2 instead of level 8 was a factor there as well.
I'm not surprised. It's kinda OP. (though I thought it might be another stealth buff for monks, though other classes get almost as much out of it)
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comparing Crane Wing in its old form to Arrow Deflection is comparing apples to oranges.
The biggest difference is that ranged attacks are most often full attacks. Melee attacks are frequently standard attacks, and the PC can force the monster to only using single attacks with simple movement and positioning.
Ranged attacks are also far less frequent then melee encounters.
And individually ranged attacks tend to be weaker.
Personally I disliked the "No roll" nature of crane wing, but the Errata version is horrible, so for me is a lose-lose situation. I pretty much prefer Snake style.
Nor should existing mechanics be disregarded because some people think they're silly. The game exists in its entirety, and listing the existing options that are equivalent to the item under discussion is a good way of establishing its balance. Balance, after all, implies two sides to an equation.
@Ser Clay - I've used In Harm's Way before, and it isn't a free deflection. Your animal companion or eidolon has to take the hit for you. That's great when the hit would disable your PC or an ally and not bad when you dump some damage into the companion and then spend your turn healing it. It isn't a "free" deflection like OCW though.
That said, stealing the DM's hit with Mounted Combat is one of the great joys of the Ride skill (though that's often not an auto success either)
i dunno, halflings can get some pretty freaking awesome ride checks (halfling order of the sword cav is MEAN).
I bet for the poor wording of Pummelign style.It's worth noting that PFS have now banned Pummeling Charge, a feat normally only available to 8th level brawlers and monks since PFS ends before anyone else reach +12 BAB.
It's hard not to think that a MoMS dip bringing the feat chain online for anyone at level 2 instead of brawlers and monks at level 8 was a factor there as well.
That would surprise me, since last time I checked pummeling style is still PFS legal - if they were worried about the 'punch' definition they'd have to ban the whole style.
Back to the OP: Crane style itself is still pretty viable.
There's a trait (can't remember the name) that reduces the penalty for fighting defensively by 1. Also, if you have 3 ranks in acrobatics, you get an additional point of AC when fighting defensively. Add Crane Style to the mix, and you can get -1 to hit and +4 AC when fighting defensively. Not a bad deal at all.
I don't think you'll find many going for the crane feats after crane style, but crane style can still be pretty good for defensive fighting.
Good point.That would surprise me, since last time I checked pummeling style is still PFS legal - if they were worried about the 'punch' definition they'd have to ban the whole style.I bet for the poor wording of Pummelign style.It's worth noting that PFS have now banned Pummeling Charge, a feat normally only available to 8th level brawlers and monks since PFS ends before anyone else reach +12 BAB.
It's hard not to think that a MoMS dip bringing the feat chain online for anyone at level 2 instead of brawlers and monks at level 8 was a factor there as well.
Agreed, since the "Pounce" thing I never found OP. It was the crit thing that I found to be WTF status. Also the totaling damage before DR on two handed weapons too.
Everyone getting pounce at level 12 using a 3 feat tax? Sure.
(Relevance of comparing Deflect Arrows to Crane Wing (pre-errata): Firearms in general and Gunslingers in particular.)
Does anyone use Tiger Style for that matter? Or Boar Style?
Seriously those guys need a rewrite.
I agree for boar style. The big damage from the first feat should not be bleed.
Boar Style looks pretty good, but my Orc is too short on feats to consider it and sticks to Vicious Stomp + Enforcer instead.
@AndIMustMask - Mounted Combat can stop a lot of hits, but you still have to roll, and it can’t stop a nat 20. The usefulness is also sometimes limited by the fact animal companion and eidolon AC scales so well, but it is great against touch attacks.
@FireberdGNOME - It would be nice to deflect a bullet, but a high level Gunslinger will be shooting more than one. I think the Pistolero in my game was making 14 attacks per round when she first showed up.
Yeah, more options on the poll would be nice. I'd fall into something like "Didn't use it before but will now". I'd imagine that's a very small group.
*plants flag* this is my group - way too good before, happy to use it now.
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I think you quoted the wrong post. Either way, IMHO, the " Option X is fine because Y is more broken" have have a horrible effect on the game.
Whoops, so I did.
And here's the thing, it's less "Option X is fine because Y is more broken" and more "Option Y is far more versatile and powerful but for some reason people consider that balanced, so why are we nerfing option X?"
I am of the train of thought that it was useful before, now it is significantly less so. I don't find myself using it on builds any more because other defensive styles, like snake, are better. As are newer options, like the swashbuckler parry, which is more convenient for the few non-monk builds who actually took the darn thing(looking at you, kensai magi) due to them getting in class options to take them.
On the few that do take Crane style, they don't take more than the basic style feat because it's not worth the investment when monks have so many feat taxes as it is, such as the dimensional line.
I think losing the ability to stop Nat 20s was the core reason to take this before, and while you still technically can if you waste the round, people don't wanna burn a whole turn only to be ignored. Thus players can just get MOAR AC elsewhere.
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We playtested it after the change to see how it turned out, and found that in general to being generally underwhelming, it really slowed down gameplay. The GM now has to ask the Crane user if he wants to try and deflect before making each attack roll. If the bonus could be applied retroactively (he rolled a 23? I use my crane wing deflect bonus!) rather than preemptively, and if the AC bonus scaled with level so it could actually keep up with, y'know, just using a shield, I'd see it as a much more viable option.
Not being hit by a nat 20 is still pretty awesome IMO. If the enemy hits you 0 times and you hit it 1 time you're probably winning. Of course this assumes that you can only be hit on a nat 20 or have some way of locking the enemy down to 1 attack (stereotypically because it is T-Rex or got hit with Frigid Touch). Of course you could also be hit with more than one nat 20 per round, but that's bad luck.
@Kudaku - Applying the bonus retroactively was the same fix I suggested when the errata first came out. It would make play smoother and enhance the value of the feat. For extra fun try using Crane Wing along with a shield (my feral gnasher just bites stuff, so he generally has a hand free)
@Kudaku - Applying the bonus retroactively was the same fix I suggested when the errata first came out. It would make play smoother and enhance the value of the feat. For extra fun try using Crane Wing along with a shield (my feral gnasher just bites stuff, so he generally has a hand free)
I wrote up a suggestion for making the deflection a Shield bonus rather than a Dodge bonus a while back. For most users it won't make much of a difference, but it limits the "I stack all teh AC bonuses" side of things and makes the improved functionality of the feat more palatable for the skeptics.
Basically a +4 Shield bonus applied retroactively, with the bonus going up by one every 4 BAB/4 levels of monk - winds up at +9 AC vs one attack, which is the same AC bonus you'd get from a +5 tower shield (though the tower shield can carry other enchantments and protects against all attacks instead of just one).
I don't know if anybody beyond the dev team thinks that applying the AC bonus retroactively would be too good. I suspect a lot of people think it still wouldn't be good enough. Perhaps it would be a step in the right direction. People probably want a leap rather than a step, but at this point it is likely a dead issue anyhow.
I don't know if anybody beyond the dev team thinks that applying the AC bonus retroactively would be too good. I suspect a lot of people think it still wouldn't be good enough. Perhaps it would be a step in the right direction. People probably want a leap rather than a step, but at this point it is likely a dead issue anyhow.
From what I can recall, Rogue Eidolon (despite being one of the proponents that old Crane Wing was broken) also argued that the feat was over-nerfed when the errata came out.
While the current ACG errata/FAQ queue doesn't exactly make me optimistic for another revision on Crane Wing, it's not impossible that the feat gets revisited somewhere down the line.
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I don't know if anybody beyond the dev team thinks that applying the AC bonus retroactively would be too good. I suspect a lot of people think it still wouldn't be good enough. Perhaps it would be a step in the right direction. People probably want a leap rather than a step, but at this point it is likely a dead issue anyhow.From what I can recall, Rogue Eidolon (despite being one of the proponents that old Crane Wing was broken) also argued that the feat was over-nerfed when the errata came out.
While the current ACG errata/FAQ queue doesn't exactly make me optimistic for another revision on Crane Wing, it's not impossible that the feat gets revisited somewhere down the line.
I am over 95% sure that I was the first person to propose making it retroactive, but I don't want to search through and read that thread because it makes me sad. We use the retroactive version in our home games, and in general use cases it is nearly statistically identical while avoiding the abuse cases (when the crane user is fighting around her own paygrade, we have rarely had a round where there was an attack that hit the crane user and no attack that hit by 4 or less), so it seems like it would be a positive outcome (everyone should playtest it though, like me, and see what you think! Who knows, maybe more people will come around to it, especially since it speeds up gameplay immensely).
@Rogue Eidolon - I wasn't asserting that I was the first person to suggest applying the AC bonus retroactively, just pointing out that I'd suggested that compromise soon after the errata. I'm sure multiple people probably had that idea independently. Unfortunately it never really seemed to catch on.
Some people might feel the feat would still be too weak that way. Others might view the errata as unjust and be unwilling to compromise. I'm not sure if anybody really thinks that making the AC bonus available retroactively would be too powerful, but Paizo might be reluctant to change Crane Wing again since that might stir up the embers of the big debate which happened after the errata and fan some new flames.
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I'd like to put my input in as someone who uses the nerfed version in PFS play...
It's EXTREMELY powerful. Way more than some people would give it credit and I've only been hit twice in my entire carear. (I was playing lower tier and those two things were an owlbear and a BIG yeti... not exactly standard opponants) To be fair, I optimized this character for defense (MoMS included along with deflect arrows), but at times it gets ridiculous when the only thing that could hit me are things with a +20 to their attack.
Will I ever play a character with this feat chain again? No. As a GM, would I ever allow someone to use the unnerfed version of the feat? Yeah, sure, especially in higher level play... but ONLY for higher level play. I certainly would not allow MoMS abuse like I did with this character, because it just gets silly.
I disagree all over this post. Using the words 'extremely powerful' and the Errata's crane wing in the same sentence strikes me as trolling in all likelyhood. Only been hit twice? At low levels when half or more things have a single attack, OK. I grudgingly admit its usefulness. At any point where fighting enemies with multiple attacks comes into play (including at low level) the feat shines at being less than useful. Why? Because you have no clue which attack is likely to hit unless it is a melee character swinging at you- in which case you always apply the bonus to the first attack. Against ranged attackers or the horde of monsters with multiple natural attacks, this feat is borderline worthless. You have no incentive to commit its use against any particular attack unless it is a natural attack you know has a nasty effect attached to it and want to be covered against that one- assuming it doesn't use it on someone else while you wait for it. So with so many attacks having an equal chance to land, you are forced to guess which one will or just commit to the first one and hope it wasn't the second or third or fourth of seventh (have you faced enemies with 7 attacks yet? I have) attack that gets through on a non-crit.
So what power are you talking about?
If you were actually being serious, explain to me how having a phenomenal ac and only being hit on a 20 or so, makes adding +4 to that ac any better? Makes confirmation rolls harder? *shrug* there are ways to get that via traits and other things and it is generally not seen as all that useful. But it's a niche thing. If you are built for high ac and tanking, current crane wing doesn't do anything for you. You already are highly unlikely to be hit. In the event that you would be hit you have no way of knowing which attack to apply crane wing to in order to avoid that hit. The more powerful enemies become, the less mechanically effective the feat becomes. Explain how this is a 'powerful' feat in any real way beyond a reasonable amount of low level play (levels 1-3)?
It can't stop crits and can't be applied effectively or where it matters.