Kysus Arelius
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Can someone advise what the standard stance is with someone that has Irori as a favored deity with Guided Hand, granting them +Wis instead of +Str to IUS strikes, if that also correlates to using +Wis to melee touch attacks?
Both actions are using your hand/fist to deliver the action so I'm confused if you'd still have to use +str to touch or instead be using +wis because of Guided Hand with Irori.
| Bob Bob Bob |
No. While you (usually) use your hands to make a melee touch attack, a melee touch attack is most emphatically not an unarmed strike (unless you use that feat? that lets you make an unarmed strike as a touch attack, but that's making unarmed strike into a touch attack and not vice-versa). Unarmed strike, while a very general term for a lot of different things, is a very specific use of your body as a weapon. A melee touch attack is a completely different kind of weapon. There's no intersection between the two. Same as an amulet of mighty fists doesn't add to melee touch attacks (or grapple) and Guided Hand also wouldn't add to CMB (unless you use an unarmed strike to deliver the maneuver, which you could with trip, disarm, and sunder).
Things do what they say. It's really that simple.
| Byakko |
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Touch attacks are armed melee attacks which use the body and bypass armor and shield AC bonuses.
Unarmed Strikes are also an armed melee attack which uses the body. However, they are a different type of armed attack, and as Bob has pointed out, bonuses to one type won't help another.
You can, however, choose to make a normal unarmed strike (versus regular AC) and additionally deliver a touch attack at the same time. See Holding the Charge. In this case, you could use Guided Hand.
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However, I do have a minor nit-pick with Bob's comments: The Amulet of Mighty Fists' enhancement should probably apply to combat maneuvers such as grapples.
From a paizo blog:
Page 199 of the Pathfinder RPG Core Rulebook says, “When you attempt to perform a combat maneuver, make an attack roll and add your CMB in place of your normal attack bonus. Add any bonuses you currently have on attack rolls due to spells, feats, and other effects. These bonuses must be applicable to the weapon or attack used to perform the maneuver.” That last sentence implies that some weapons apply their bonuses on combat maneuver checks, and some do not. So how do you know which weapons do? The answer depends on what kind of combat maneuver you’re attempting, and in some cases what kind of weapon you’re using.
Disarm, sunder, and trip are normally the only kinds of combat maneuvers in which you’re actually using a weapon (natural weapons and unarmed strikes are considered weapons for this purpose) to perform the maneuver, and therefore the weapon’s bonuses (enhancement bonuses, feats such as Weapon Focus, fighter weapon training, and so on) apply to the roll.
For other maneuvers, either you’re not using a weapon at all, or the weapon is incidental to making the maneuver and its bonuses shouldn’t make you better at attempting the maneuver. For example, just because you have a +5 greatsword doesn’t mean it gives you a +5 bonus on dirty trick checks (Pathfinder RPG Advanced Player’s Guide 320), and just because you have a +5 dagger doesn’t mean it gives you a +5 bonus on grapple checks. Of course, the GM is free to rule that in certain circumstances, a creature can apply weapon bonuses for these maneuvers, such as when using a sap in a dirty trick maneuver to hit an opponent in a sensitive spot.
To sum it up, as long as the type of weapon is appropriate for making the combat maneuver, you can apply any enhancement bonus on the weapon.
Granted it is GM discretion, but I believe most would agree that unarmed attacks are an appropriate weapon for grappling, and thus would benefit from AoMF's enhancement bonus.
| Bob Bob Bob |
I don't think this has made it to FAQs, but here is the Design Team ruling. No Amulet of Mighty Fists and grappling, because grappling is not an unarmed strike. Again, unarmed strike is a very specific kind of weapon, unless you can use a weapon to do what you want to you can't use any bonuses to an unarmed strike.
| Byakko |
Interesting. I think they totally made the wrong call in this case, however. Btw, I never said grappling was an unarmed strike. Reread what I wrote/posted.
TL/DR: If you can deliver a trip with a mace, then you should also be able to deliver a grapple with an unarmed strike. If you're using your unarmed strike to deliver the grapple, then you receive any enhancement bonus on it to your CMB check per the blog.