Goblin Squad Member
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As we get closer to early enrollment, the need for resources for new players become more urgent, as PFO has a lot of systems and subsystems (keywords, feats, crafting) that can be very difficult for new players (little to no MMO experience) to understand.
We have some resources available, but it is scattered in different places. Cheatle has a good guide to start, and i would like to expand on his work. Same with spreadsheets and tables, and online tools (Calculator and PF HQ).
I will be working on information on Coldstart XP and "builds" this week, but i need help with the keywords and combat math sections as I struggle to understand them myself.
I will post some ideas here and any feedback is welcomed.
Who else is available to help me in this effort?
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Goblin Squad Member
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I read the Keyboard section you wrote, I understand the concept of "match A from this" with "match A from that". It's a struggle to put it in practice. I'm on My cell so I can't access website, but basically its hard to make useful sense of keywords ingame or with spreadsheets.
For example:
1- Weapon + Attack Feat plus,
2- Armor + Armor feats plus,
3- Hats, boots, belts, gloves... plus,
4- Defensive feats plus,
5- Reactive feats plus,
6- Role features plus,
7- something else?
Getting keywords to work on each separate line, and then combined with other lines is... Confusing.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I'm sorry... I'm not exactly sure I understand what you mean.
You want the article to show every keyword and all its potential matches? Or you want to show every piece of Gear, its keywords, and all of its potential matches to Feats?
Let me try again. I posted 7 examples. If you look at it like a crossword puzzle:
(Across) #1 Weapons + Attack feats
(Down) Items #1 - #7 interacting with each other.
In other words, I can figure out how each line interacts within itself (Weapon + Weapon Attacks) but not how all lines worth together as a whole (Weapons + Armor + Role + Reactive + Defensives).
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Goblin Squad Member
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As John Cleese taught us, everyone needs an idiom. The idiom describes the battle plan of what you want to do, then you take feats from each (Down) line that add to the strengths (or mitigate glaring weaknesses) of that theme. If certain things aren't adding strength to the idiom then they can be dismissed for that build.
Are you a fast attacking melee interrupter like Sspitfire's recently posted build? Synergetic feats include Stop reactives, hp defensives so you have more time to work, gap closing utilities so you can get in melee range to do your thing, etc.
If you're the popular bow cleric then you take evasion utilities to stay out of melee and slowing reactives to keep melee targets away, and more anti-magic oriented defensive feats for long-distance battles with magic users. Your armor/feature feats do well to add speed to enhance the idea of you staying distant raining down arrows and running faster than pursuers to self heal as needed before returning to battle.
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Goblin Squad Member
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@Proxima Sin,
That is the kind of information on "builds" I am searching for. Thanks.
More examples like this is exactly what I am looking for. :)
How do you determine that kind of information? What resources do you use to put that kind of multi-system components working together as a whole? That is what I am trying to understand.
(Not having my PC repaired, no access to internet and no game has slowed me down in my research.)
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Goblin Squad Member
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We should, definitely, have a section in the wiki where a user can find proposed builds and synergistic discussions; however, it might be early to really delve in to this sort of thing because not everything works in the game and most things have not been tested extensively.
That is really why I have been more focused on explaining HOW things work, so that people can make informed decisions and try builds out for themselves.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Its important new players learn early that (with limited exceptions like special materials) the keyword itself has no meaning.
Example the keyword QUIET does not make armor silent. Nor does matching the keyword suddenly invoke some "quiet" ability in a feat.The keyword could just as easily have been called LLAMA or MUSHROOM.
All the name QUIET does is give you a hint as to where to look for items and feats with the same keyword for matches - "oh if the armor has a keyword called QUIET it must be sneaky, so maybe a rogue armor feat will match it".
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Goblin Squad Member
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Which is exactly why I put the following information first in the article:
The Word:
The first thing to know about keywords is that the word itself is NOT important: the mechanics would work in the exact same way if the keywords were all replaced with completely different, randomly generated, words.For example, the keyword "Heavy" on some Armor types might as well be the word "Blueberry," or "Keyword9T," for all the difference it makes to the game.
I would like to hear some feedback on the article (it is a WIP, so keep that in mind), so don't be afraid to chime in.
Daz
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Goblin Squad Member
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Which is exactly why I put the following information first in the article:The Word:
The first thing to know about keywords is that the word itself is NOT important: the mechanics would work in the exact same way if the keywords were all replaced with completely different, randomly generated, words.For example, the keyword "Heavy" on some Armor types might as well be the word "Blueberry," or "Keyword9T," for all the difference it makes to the game.
I would like to hear some feedback on the article (it is a WIP, so keep that in mind), so don't be afraid to chime in.
Daz
Oh good, well done.
That stuff you quoted does not show up for me so maybe it is waiting to be updated or something.
Another thing people seem to get confused on is magic weapons and orisons/cantrips. It may be worth pointing out that each wand or staff type (diminishing/psychic etc) and each focus type (battle/occult etc) have different keywords at +1 and higher and therefore you need to match the orison or cantrip to staff type once you begin using higher level mage/cleric weapons.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Which is exactly why I put the following information first in the article:The Word:
The first thing to know about keywords is that the word itself is NOT important: the mechanics would work in the exact same way if the keywords were all replaced with completely different, randomly generated, words.For example, the keyword "Heavy" on some Armor types might as well be the word "Blueberry," or "Keyword9T," for all the difference it makes to the game.
I would like to hear some feedback on the article (it is a WIP, so keep that in mind), so don't be afraid to chime in.
Daz
Oh good, well done.
That stuff you quoted does not show up for me so maybe it is waiting to be updated or something.
Another thing people seem to get confused on is magic weapons and orisons/cantrips. It may be worth pointing out that each wand or staff type (diminishing/psychic etc) and each focus type (battle/occult etc) have different keywords at +1 and higher and therefore you need to match the orison or cantrip to staff/wand/focus type once you begin using higher level mage/cleric weapons.
It seems intuitive that say a rapier and a longsword will have different attacks and in game you cannot slot a rapier attack with a longsword equipped - but with magic weapons because the wrong attack can be slotted and still works (just far less effectively) people seem to get confused.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Right now it's especially difficult to develop long-term PVE builds, because the NPC AI ignores many attack effects (knockdown, push back, immobilize, etc.). We have a choice between building for the moment (focusing totally on raw damage numbers), or building for the long haul (planning ahead for when attack effects start affecting NPCs).
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Goblin Squad Member
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That stuff you quoted does not show up for me so maybe it is waiting to be updated or something.
Another thing people seem to get confused on is magic weapons and orisons/cantrips. It may be worth pointing out that each wand or staff type (diminishing/psychic etc) and each focus type (battle/occult etc) have different keywords at +1 and higher and therefore you need to match the orison or cantrip to staff/wand/focus type once you begin using higher level mage/cleric weapons.
It seems intuitive that say a rapier and a longsword will have different attacks and in game you cannot slot a rapier attack with a longsword equipped - but with magic weapons because the wrong attack can be slotted and still works (just far less effectively) people seem to get confused.
Indeed; which is why I added the following section:
Caster Weapons:
Special attention should be paid when matching caster-type weapons with appropriate attack feats. While all Physical Weapons (Daggers, Longbow, Longsword, etc.) have the exact same Keyword Progression, Caster Weapons (Focus, Staff, Wand) do not. Wizard Staffs could have the Diminishing or the Charged tags. Cleric Focuses could be Occult or Battle focused. These different classes will determine what keywords a particular weapon has.
Unfortunately, the PFO Wiki is still having caching issues which prevent people from seeing the most up-to-date version of a page. Going through the 'View History' tab will fix it.
I will post the entire article, in PDF form, somewhere, when I get it complete.
Daz
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Goblin Squad Member
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For any interested, please check-out the PDF version of the Keywords guide here.
It is not complete, yet. The Keyword Progression section still needs to be done.
Let me know what y'all think. Feedback wanted and welcomed.
Daz
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Goblin Squad Member
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Fantastic work Dazyk!
one thing tho, I pretty sure Stephen told me that even gear on other bodyparts match gloves and boots slots.
The keyword, as you note, is used for Utilities. There isn't a large number of utility keywords, and they tend to repeat on different body slot items so you have a better chance of getting a collection of them that works for your particular Utilities and gear loadout. Having two with the same keyword (in different slots) is redundant; they don't stack in any way. Vehement is used for Trip, True Strike, and a few Utilities that aren't working yet.
As we where discussing my Stocking Cap+2 at the time clothing in general seems to match the Gloves and Boot utility (which I think is in dire need of renaming to avoid confusion).
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Goblin Squad Member
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Fantastic work Dazyk!
one thing tho, I pretty sure Stephen told me that even gear on other bodyparts match gloves and boots slots.
As we where discussing my Stocking Cap+2 at the time clothing in general seems to match the Gloves and Boot utility (which I think is in dire need of renaming to avoid confusion).
The keyword, as you note, is used for Utilities. There isn't a large number of utility keywords, and they tend to repeat on different body slot items so you have a better chance of getting a collection of them that works for your particular Utilities and gear loadout. Having two with the same keyword (in different slots) is redundant; they don't stack in any way. Vehement is used for Trip, True Strike, and a few Utilities that aren't working yet.
That is correct. I did, originally, have 'Other Gear' listed with 'Feet, Hands' but had thought that it made it more complicated than it needed to be.
I think I will change it back.
Thanks Schedim!
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Goblin Squad Member
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Excellently written, Dazyk. You talk about how strong Keywords are relative to one another, but would it also be useful to include somewhere what mechanical benefit each matched Keyword brings?
Forgive me if that's on another nearby page; as you know, I can't see most of the wiki without an account...which I still can't get.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Thank you Jazz.
Yes, indeed, it would be useful to have the Keyword math spelled out. I think I will add that after the Keyword Progression section.
Thanks for the tip!
PS, sorry for the wiki troubles :(
I am strongly considering pdf'ing some of the more important guides and hosting them somewhere else (Nihimon's shared folder, likely) just so that everyone can have access to it.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Ok this bit:
Expendables are slightly different: The keywords do not exist on the Gear itself (the Implement, in this case). Instead, the keywords are found on the Expendable; therefore, the Expendable must first be found, then learned (like a Feat), and then equipped (slotted to the Implement, before the keywords that match from the Expendable pair with the keywords on your slotted Feature Feat.
Is a little hard to follow. Try something like this:
Expendables are slightly different: When you find and learn an expendable (for example a wizard spell) that expendable has keywords. However when you equip the appropriate gear (the Spellbook Implement, in this example) and slot the expendable into the UI you will find no matching keywords on the Gear itself . To find a match for an expendable keyword you need to look at the slotted Feature Feat (for example slotted Wizard School).
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Goblin Squad Member
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why is it that when I drag a class feature (necromancer) into the class feature slot on the equip menu it wont go in? Same with the mage feat in its outlined slot wont go in. Why is this?
It's a bug. If you drag it in and close-open paper doll again, it should show as slotted.