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With a normal touch spell, you can cast the spell and then hold the charge to be discharged at a later time. Does the same apply to supernatural touch abilities?
As an example:
The shaman has access to the following hex from their Flames spirit.
Ward of Flames (Su): The shaman touches a willing creature (including herself ) and grants a ward of flames. The next time the warded creature is struck with a melee attack, the creature making the attack takes 1d6 points of fire damage + 1 point of fire damage for every 2 shaman levels she possesses. This ward lasts for 1 minute, after which it fades away if not already expended. At 8th and 16th levels, the ward lasts for one additional attack. Once this ward ends, the creature cannot be the target of this hex again for 24 hours.
Can the shaman use a standard action to activate the ability and then hold the charge to touch a subject and grant the ward multiple rounds later?
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How do you imagine this to be useful? My first inclination is to answer no, because it is not spell-like, but I am curious what you are trying to do.
Their are a lot of buff hexes that are on the spirit lists that are potentially interesting, but that have horrible durations. Or they are just not powerful enough to warrant the use of a precious action in combat.
However, if they could be pre-cast ahead of time and held, the shaman can use his familiar to deliver the touch using it's actions and the crappy durations would not be as big of an issue.
I'm trying to look at ways to make some of the currently less interesting hexes more useful.
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It takes a standard action to deliver the held charge.
You would gain nothing by "casting" it earlier.
Deliver Touch Spells (Su)If a shaman is 3rd level or higher, her spirit animal can deliver touch spells or hexes for her. If the shaman and the spirit animal are in contact at the time the shaman casts a touch spell, she can designate her animal as the "toucher." The spirit animal can then deliver the touch spell just as the shaman would. If the shaman casts another spell before the touch is delivered, the touch spell dissipates. If the shaman activates a hex, her spirit animal can be used to make the touch; she doesn't have to be in contact with the animal to use this ability with hexes.
The shaman's spirit animal can deliver the held charge using its action.
Per the RAW, only touch *spells* can be held. Supernatural abilities cannot be.
Some touch spells allow you to touch multiple targets as part of the spell. You can't hold the charge of such a spell; you must touch all targets of the spell in the same round that you finish casting the spell.
Furthermore, the verbiage in the shaman text would seem to indicate that you cannot hold the charge on a hex.
Note how touch spells are explicitly spelt out as not dissipating, implying that they can be held, and no such verbiage exists with the hex?
While this is not a rock-hard ruling, it seems to be the closest thing I can find to a RAW ruling.
If you're in PFS, you'll probably have to abide by this, unless you get a lenient judge. If you're not, just ask your DM. It's not a big stretch at all.
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Thanks, Brogue The Rogue. That was my conclusion as well. I wanted to open the discussion up to the forum quick just to make sure i hadn't potentially missed anything.
I really want to like all of the spirit hexes but some of them just have too many darn limitations on them.
I'm not in a PFS game with this character, so i may run it by my GM just to give the idea a test to see if it's actually helpful at all.