Eating Tomes

[DLE]

Strange question, I apologize if it has been addressed somewhere else. When a Tome Eater Occultist eats a book, do they absorb the knowledge, effectively "reading" it? Thematically, I think it fits, and would house rule that for my personal game. But I'm looking at a Pathfinder Society character, and want to make sure that I play it correctly.

[gnoams]

The 5th level ability does give you a general idea of what a book is about by looking at it, and you can skim read it as a standard action, but I don't see anything under the book eating ability that says you get to learn anything from the book. So no, unfortunately you can't read books by eating them.

[CampinCarl9127]

gnoams wrote:

So no, unfortunately you can't read books by eating them.

Pity. College students everywhere would be ecstatic.

[Lifat]

CampinCarl9127 wrote:

gnoams wrote:

So no, unfortunately you can't read books by eating them.

Pity. College students everywhere would be ecstatic.

Publishers would be extatic to. The only ones that would have a sad face would be libraries (and librarians) :P

[Zwordsman]

Really that should be inset in the archetype. I do see why it isn't. incredibly useful.
I also wish that standard action "get the feeling for it" would also apply to random papers too. So I could read that notice or report on the guys desk without him noticing. Though that's gm fiat i supose

But I wish there was a power set for tome eaters that you could chose intead of a school

letting you retain all the knowledge of eatin books, letting you enchant books to improve focus powers or something

Letting you write quickly, and hidden messages in yoru book focus.

Letting you shunt off a failed will save into the book as a story you'll have ot read and accept the downside at a later date for (basically postponing failed willsave by some amount of rounds)

Hidding in a book. suppose that would let others carry the book and you effectively but you also might die in a bag of holding. Or stuck in a library shelf because you don't have the strength to push the book open on the shelf.

stuff like that
============
As a Librarian I would love this power (order one extra copy of every book in the library. Eat the extra copy.

You now can perfectly recommend a book for someone. You know exactly what every book is like. You can also help people find books they read but no longer remember fully

You'd be a wonderful librarian.

also the divination stuff means no one could steal your books, and you'd always know who damaged a book.

fixing would be easy too.

[Lifat]

Zwordsman wrote:

As a Librarian I would love this power (order one extra copy of every book in the library. Eat the extra copy.

You now can perfectly recommend a book for someone. You know exactly what every book is like. You can also help people find books they read but no longer remember fully

You'd be a wonderful librarian.

also the divination stuff means no one could steal your books, and you'd always know who damaged a book.

fixing would be easy too.

Oh yes! It would be immensely useful as a librarian if you were the only one who had that power. But imagine if you had to order a new copy every time someone "borrowed" a book, because they would eat it... Annoying!

[Zwordsman]

Lifat wrote:

Zwordsman wrote:

As a Librarian I would love this power (order one extra copy of every book in the library. Eat the extra copy.

You now can perfectly recommend a book for someone. You know exactly what every book is like. You can also help people find books they read but no longer remember fully

You'd be a wonderful librarian.

also the divination stuff means no one could steal your books, and you'd always know who damaged a book.

fixing would be easy too.

Oh yes! It would be immensely useful as a librarian if you were the only one who had that power. But imagine if you had to order a new copy every time someone "borrowed" a book, because they would eat it... Annoying!

Well they'd have to pay me for the magic copying.

Pretty sure if I had it all memorized I could use one of the varoius creation spells to make copies with.

[Zwordsman]

Revive with a new question!

So
Devour Books and Scrolls (Sp)
"A tome eater can devour books and scrolls in order to gain various benefits. Devouring a book or scroll is a full-round action that provokes attacks of opportunity. A devoured book or scroll is absorbed into the tome eater's body and completely destroyed"

This replaces various things but it isn't specificlly listed when this ability is gained..

level four it says "At 4th level, once per day a tome eater can devour a spell scroll or a book to regain mental focus, which she can divide as she likes among her schools of magic, to a maximum of the amount of mental focus she assigned to that school at the beginning of the day."

So. Can you eat the book from level 1-3 just not regain anything?

At level four and beyond. Can you eat the book just to eat it ? Not gaining points and all. Just eating the books

As near as I can tell... since its not properly labeled when you get the ability. and the use of can at level 4.

I'm taking it to mean. I can always eat books I just do not gain benefits of eating books or scrolls until I'm high enough level. I can eat as many as I want but I only gain benefits once

So thoughts?

[Brian Raivel]

I see it's been a while since someone posted here, so I hope my question gets answered.

PFS question.
if my tome eater eats a scroll or spell book listed on the chronicle sheet, does that mean it is no longer available? since it is "permanently destroyed"
thanks