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Alex, I would enjoy sending a private message to you about this as to not derail the thread with a side-conversation. Would you mind allowing for private messages, or send me one?I have no objection to that, but haven't the foggiest on how to do that...
My account -> Privacy Settings (will be in the left column) -> check the box labeled "members may send me private messages"
My account -> Privacy Settings (will be in the left column) -> check the box labeled "members may send me private messages"Alex, I would enjoy sending a private message to you about this as to not derail the thread with a side-conversation. Would you mind allowing for private messages, or send me one?I have no objection to that, but haven't the foggiest on how to do that...
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Im only a poor 3 Starrer for the next few days/weeksFair enough. How about this, if you read the rules and conclude they are allowed despite all that has been said then you are following RAW. Well, at least your version of RAW.
Im not trying to be mean or rude. As far as I can tell it seems like there are only 3 individuals saying its not legal, PFS or otherwise. There may be more, but as far as I can recall, it seems mostly to be yourself and BNW saying no.
But, I do not understand why. Honestly, I don't get the arguement/evidence. I would like to, because I'm interested in seeing different sides to it, but it seems to be that people say no because they just don't like it or care for it, but there is nothing to really back it up (it doesn't work because A, B, and C), outside of a preference.
I really don't have any horse in this race. The closest I'd come is maybe a total reflavoring to make a "Werepuppy" for fun.
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To actually post something halfway constructive to this thread, I can certainly see the logic of both sides. The way I see it both sides are having to use anecdotal evidence to at least some degree to prove their points over the other side. One side is using the Tail Terror FAQ as anecdotal evidence that the fluff of the feat is still important to the functioning of the feat, while the other is using anecdotal evidence that you are able to fill in missing information.
However, it is my personal opinion that the evidence supplied by the "pro" side has been much better presented, breaks less systems than the evidence given by the other side, and is simply more compelling as a whole. As such, I would currently say that RAW would allow you to use the ability as a human with the correct feats.
I just wanted to take the time to clarify something in my arguments that may have become confused due to my previous tone. I admit that i may have been a bit to aggressive in my delivery of the arguments. Its just that the way the opposing case was being argues seemed, to me, too repetitive and unfounded.
I stand by my current gut feeling that, as written, the feat works for a human as written, but i now understand that we've both seemed to reach a point where the main proponents of each side have become thoroughly entrenched in their views.
Im still happy to discuss it, but for my own sanity and to avoid reaching a point where i become overtly frustrated, i think i wont be commenting on parts of the argument where there is no new information.
Wolf and Risner, I just wanted to especially clarify that i hold nothing against either of you. If i seemed like i was attacking you, just know that it was never my intent to do so.
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Also, i used to be a rues advisor in MTG. I just love through analysis of a rules system for some reason!
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About mysticism and a feat, people must really hate Eldritch Heritage
The Tail Terror FAQ is such a travesty.
With Inner Sea Races, I think we may have a way for tieflings to qualify for the Tail Terror feat. Apparently they get "Pass for Human" as an alternate racial trait that functions much like the aasimar's "Scion of Humanity". With that trait, they qualify for the Racial Heritage feat. Unlike humans, tieflings can very well have tails -- so a tiefling with Pass for Human and Racial Heritage (Kobold) could not only take the Tail Terror feat but could actually use it.
Owner - D20 Hobbies
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it seems to be that people say no because they just don't like it or care for it
There are a lot of rules I don't like or care for (Blood Money is one), but I still follow the RAW.
The people saying no are using words in the rules to reject your interpretation. I'll summarize the interpretation of the rules used by the "other side".
Both of these have been pointed out previously in this thread:
You can change into a fox in addition to your other forms.
This feat allows changing into a different form than normally allowed. The language assumes you can take forms. All uses of the word form to date has referred to a polymorph effect.
Changing from kitsune to fox shape is a standard action.
Use of this feat is restricted to changing from a kitsune not under an existing polymorph effect to fox shape. If you are not a kitsune in an antimagic field, then you can't use this feat.
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RPG rules (Pathfinder and D&D both) are written in a more conversational way. When a precise filter has been applied in the interpretation of rules in the past, a number of those interpretations have resulted in FAQ answers that seem perplexing to those that interpret the rules in this way.
Courageous weapon property, Sound Striker Weird Words, Double Cha to AC stacking, etc. Most of these issues received FAQ because they were interpreted in a liberal way ignoring context and contrary evidence.
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What James Jacobs says is in line to my overall stance about this subject. The overall subject is something that is gone through in various threads that have a correlation between descriptions and rules text.
Going into it, the Thunder and Fang feat had a period that made the character use an Earth Breaker with one hand. It should have been a comma to include the Klar particulars that came after it. (...with one hand, klar stuff)
Tail Terror can be used by a human (with Racial Heritage) if they can get a tail, such as using a Monkey Belt.
I never thought the Fox Shape was overly powerful, I just see a parallel between this and other Description/rules discrepancy. The Kitsune is getting an additional form that works in the same way as the first. As a human, taking this feat shouldn't automatically give him the second (Kitsune) form as well as the fox form, so being described as "an addition to your other forms" when the human only has the one, the feat seems out of place. This doesn't prevent the Human from taking the feat with Racial Heritage, it just makes it so he need some other way to have other forms so he can use the third. I think the Shapeshifter Archtype for the ranger may be able to qualify him for that, or the Druids shapeshifting ability. It isn't impossible to do.
See, having teeth is a whole lot different than an innate ability to change shape from an anthromorphic fox to a human, so is having skin that grows scales, tongues that go 10 feet, hands that grow claws, and various other things that some of these feats do.
I would use common sense. It is what was suggested by the designer in the Tail Slap thread. (McFarland responded there)
To be fair, though, this feat does have a bit more ambiguity than the other examples. Thunder and Fang actually says that the character has learned to fight with the Earth Breaker and Klar, Tail Slap mentions that one has strengthened his tail and so on, but this one simply states that this is "in addition to your other forms" and does not specifically call out the shape change ability by name. To me, though, that isn't a green light to discount the "fluff" completely and just go by the text of the main rules text without the descriptions context.
It, by first glance and now, is a simple question that I have posted before.
Do you have (thing)? If no, you can't use (ability)
Schroeder's tails and phantom shape shifting aside, there is a lot of abilities that feats taken through Racial Heritage would not work for a human, and I can imagine a thread for each one through infinitum. Each will have something slightly different that isn't "the same" as the example before. This is Tail Slap all over again.
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When the thread first began, my initial reaction was that this should not be allowed.
Over the course of the thread I've realised that was just a knee-jerk "different = bad" reaction.
I can't say for PFS, but otherwise this seems like a valid combo to me.
The PFS house rule is that your character's actual race must match the feat's prereq if it's from the Advanced Race Guide.But the PFS house rule allows Racial Heritage. When you take Racial Heritage Kitsune, you count as a Kitsune for pretty much everything, including taking Kitsune only feats.
You count as both human and that race for any effects related to race.That is much stronger wording than merely saying that you now can take that race's racial feats. It actually says you count as a member of that race.
So when the PFS Additional Resources says about
Feats: kitsune feats on page 5 are legal for kitsune characters; all feats on pages 24-25That's okay for your human character who takes the Racial Heritage Kitsune: she counts as a Kitsune character, so she can take the Feat.
The chain of events goes something like this.
Feat says "Only a kitsune can take this feat"Racial heritage says "you are treated as a kitsune so go ahead and take that feat"
Then the PFS house rule says "This is Pathfinder Society Organized Play, and we decided only kitsune can take the kitsune feats from this book. Your listed race is Human so you can't take the feat, but Kitsune feats from other books may be available on a book by book basis because of Racial Heritage"
I think the chain of events rather is
PFS Additional Resources allows Kitsune Feats in Dragon Empires Primer for Kitsune Player Characters.
Fox Shape Requires you be a Kitsune.
Racial Heritage is allowed in PFS.
Racial Heritage Kitsune lets a Human count as a Kitsune, and so
can take the Feat.
What's required to make this character building option illegal for PFS play is an official caveat limiting the utility of the Racial Heritage Feat, and I haven't seen one.
As far as I can tell, a PFS GM who rules a PFS Player's characters...
It explicitly does not work that way. PFS is an exception to the exception, as it were.
You can take up the discussion here.
What doesn't work what way?It explicitly does not work that way. PFS is an exception to the exception, as it were.
You can take up the discussion here.
The race restriction in the language "Feats: kitsune feats on page 5 are legal for kitsune characters; all feats on pages 24-25" does not include humans with racial heritage (kitsune). When you are a human with racial heritage, you are a human character, not a kitsune character. This is different than an effect related to race, it is explicitly stating that you must be a kitsune character.
The explanation can be found in the thread I linked above. At least, that's my understanding of the subject.
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What doesn't work what way? As far as I can tell, no exception to the Racial Heritage Feat is being made.It explicitly does not work that way. PFS is an exception to the exception, as it were.
You can take up the discussion here.
It doesn't work that way with Advanced Race Guide for the simple reason that Paizo said it didn't. It's a house rule for PFS. That may not be the answer you want, but it's the answer.
What I'm curious about is if the Aditional Resource entry for Dragon Empires Primer is intended to exclude racial heritage from taking the kitsune feats in that book or not.
As an example of a house rule, I'm working on a homebrew campaign using Pathfinder rules. In this game players wont be able to select the Pathfinder Setting gods or specific languages. The rules say you can, the campaign's house rules say "no, you must pick from the list I'm providing". Similarly the Gunslinger class wont be available. Having the class means that no matter how rare, guns are still common enough that many people have developed an advanced method of using them. In my campaign guns are too rare for that to have happened.
These are rules specific and exclusive to this one campaign. Just as the PFS Campaign excludes you from using racial heritage to gain feats, traits, and archtypes from Advanced Race Guide.
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Slightly off the topic, but isn't it kind of lame to use your many alias to post in a thread and "favorite" your own posts in an attempt to make it look like more people agree with you?
For clarity in case people haven't picked up on it from my mentioning this character multiple times in many posts, this IS an alias. I normally post under my name, not a character's name.
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Owner - D20 Hobbies
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Human ... Racial Heritage Kitsune is that I count as a Kitsune
You will have significant trouble if you try to actually use this logic in a game. At least in my games your Kitsune feats will be illegal as a Human with Racial Heritage in PFS.
Expect a fair number of the more experienced GM's to fall on that side. With the exception of the experienced GM - DM Beckett, I've been unable to find another PFS GM that wouldn't make your character illegal.
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Human ... Racial Heritage Kitsune is that I count as a KitsuneYou will have significant trouble if you try to actually use this logic in a game. At least in my games your Kitsune feats will be illegal as a Human with Racial Heritage in PFS.
Expect a fair number of the more experienced GM's to fall on that side. With the exception of the experienced GM - DM Beckett, I've been unable to find another PFS GM that wouldn't make your character illegal.
For PFS I'd rule it illegal for now to take fox shape as a human with racial heritage. But that's only until I can get an official ruling on if Racial Heritage bypasses the restriction made in the Additional Resource doc. The wording of the Dragon Empires Primer entry is a little vague in that regard. But for home games, I'd rule it's allowed.
It's on page 5. Pages 24-25 are not racial feats; they're just Tian Xia-flavored, mostly for monks but some are open to almost any character.
Fox Shape still reads to me as modifying a pre-existing shapechanging ability, rather than granting one.
So I find myself falling in to the camp of "Humans with Racial Heritage can take it, but unless they have a shapechanging ability to modify with it then it doesn't do anything".
That might be what Paizo meant to say that in the Additional Resources Section, but they didn't say that.
They said those Feats are allowed for Kitsune characters, and they said that if you take Racial Heritage Kitsune, you count as a Kitsune character. That's a legal interpretation of the rules, and PFS Players can demand to be allowed to play characters like that.
The PFS rule is different. It says you must be a kitsune character in order to take those specific feats. Taking racial heritage allows you to qualify as a kitsune for taking feats and effects related to race, but it does not make you a kitsune character if you are a human with racial heritage. I believe this is an important distinction.
...It doesn't say that your shapeshifting ability is enhanced so that you can also take the form of a fox. It just says you can take the form of a fox.
Take a Feat, get the Benefit.
Benefit: You can take the form of a foxFor this Feat, the Benefit is "You can take the Form of a fox".
Your selective quote left out the part you're arguing against. The second half of the sentence you quoted is "...in addition to your other forms."
Sure, reasonable people can argue about that meaning, but leaving it out when making your argument isn't helpful.
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Not sure how you're misinterpreting this. But once again the entry in the ARD on the Advanced Race Guide says
Note: Alternate racial traits, racial archetypes, racial evolutions, racial feats, and racial spells are only available for characters of the associated race. Racial equipment and magic items can be purchased and used by any race as long as the specific item permits it (for example, only halflings can purchase and use solidsmoke pipeweed).
Read that bolded section again. Italic emphasis the key word here. It is specifically saying that ONLY that specific race can take the racial items in this book outside of items (if the item permits it). This means ONLY a dwarven fighter can use the Foehammer archetype in Pathfinder Society Organized Play. Not a human who has racial heritage: dwarf. A human with racial heritage: kitsune can't take magical tails because they are a human who's treated as a kitsune, but still human.
Or to try explaining it another way, look at your character sheet. What race does it list? If you want something from the advanced race guide that's a racial feat, trait, heritage, or archtype the race listed in that part of your character sheet must match the race the item is restricted to.
This ONLY applies for Pathfinder Society Organized Play, in your home games this isn't true.
For the Dragon Empires Primer book the ARD says
Feats: kitsune feats on page 5 are legal for kitsune characters
This to me is a tad ambiguous when you throw in the Racial heritage feat. It's not saying only characters with "kitsune" written in the Race field can take it, but that's implied. So I'd say "no" while GMing for PFS until I get an official answer on if racial heritage is allowed to bypass this restriction or not in PFS play. Nor would I try this as a player till I got an official ruling.
Once again for a home game though, go for it.
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After making the player show me that his character is based on Allowed Resources that he purchased, I would nod my head sagely and say to the whole table, "Let this be a lesson to you all. He who buys the cool books gets to use the cool stuff. When we rise from this table, go forth and buy more Pathfinder books. But now, we play!" You GMs are (unpaid) customer service representatives of Paizo Publishing. You are supposed to support the players in their efforts to build cool characters by buying stuff.
I think we're agreeing without knowing we agree. I bolded the part that calls this fact to the fore. What may be in question is how one line in the additional resources document interacts with a feat. One entry shuts he feat down for that particular book. The other is a little unclear when you factor in the feat.
But yeah, someone sees a person at my table is playing a cool class or race, I will point out "This is what you get access to when you buy the additional books". Course, if it's a boon race I would still want to verify they also have the boon allowing them to be that race.
Just as I can play kitsune and aasimar (with boon) because I bought the required books. Or I can play a spiritualist and kineticist because I bought the Occult Adventurers book. Very cool book IMO. I still have to follow the ARD though. Which means no matter how cool I think the Ghost Whip spell is, I can't take it with a PFS character.
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Since I haven't seen anyone ask or answer this, I'll ask.
If you were allowed to use Heritage to take those feats, what purpose does the AR restriction even serve? If it doesn't prevent you from using those feats unless you actually are 100% that race (meaning not using RH), then it is literally as if they went to the CRB in Additional Resources and added
Note: Two-Weapon Fighting is only available to characters with Dex 15
They wouldn't reiterate the feat prerequisites in the AR, that's just dumb. Not to mention, it's already been explicitly stated by management (and linked higher up this thread) that Racial Heritage does NOT override the restriction for the ARG and other books with the explicit restriction.
Note that this is not a general rules clarification, it is PFS specific, so any reasons that aren't specific to PFS are basically irrelevant.
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Strange as it seems, Racial Heritage does make you a Kitsune character if you are a human with Racial Heritage: Kitsune. Look at how strong the language of the Feat is.You count as both human and that race for any effects related to race. For example... taking traits, featsSo vis a vis the Allowed Resources comments for Dragon Empire Primer that the Kitsune Feats are available for Kitsune characters, a Human character with Racial Heritage: Kitsune does count as a Kitsune character. And while it's certainly possible that the Additional Resources section of the PFS webpage is capable of trumping the Racial Heritage Feat in any way it wants, the quoted sections posted on this thread just don't do that. They might even have meant to do that, but they didn't.
The problem is that normally the rules work the other way. The Additional Resources is the General Rule, and the more Specific Rule from Racial Heritage is the exception that breaks the norm. Similarly, you can't create a new Aasimar, because they are no longer a legal option. But, if you have the Boon, you then can.
However, this is all a bit redundant as Fox Shape IS NOT found in the APG, but rather in the Dragon Empires Primer, and Mike Brock did officially rule that that specific line about "only this race can take these options" ONLY applies to the APG. I quoted it above.
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Alternate racial traits, racial archetypes, racial feats, and racial spells are only available for characters of the associated race. Racial equipment and magic items can be purchased and used by any race as long as the specific item permits it (for example, only halflings can purchase and use solidsmoke pipeweed).
So, no, a half-orc or half-elf may not take a human-only feat.
Thanks for the quick response.
Does this change the previous forum post's ruling as well? Can a half-elf still be a Spire Defender Magus? Or does this only apply to the new Advanced Race Guide feats/archetypes/spells?
It does not apply to all previous rulings in other books. This applies to the Advanced Race Guide. You can find my official ruling in the Additional Resources.
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The PFS rule is different. It says you must be a kitsune character in order to take those specific feats. Taking racial heritage allows you to qualify as a kitsune for taking feats and effects related to race, but it does not make you a kitsune character if you are a human with racial heritage. I believe this is an important distinction.
Just to help clarify for all the new posters here, this is what Racial Heritage actually says:
The blood of a non-human ancestor flows in your veins.
Prerequisite: Human.
Benefit: Choose another humanoid race. You count as both human and that race for any effects related to race. For example, if you choose dwarf, you are considered both a human and a dwarf for the purpose of taking traits, feats, how spells and magic items affect you, and so on.
I don't mean that to be rude, it's just something that has been pretty well covered already. The entire point of the Feat is that a Human counts as both a Human and one other Humanoid Creature for all purposes. It doesn't say that you can take other racial options as if you where that race, but you are not actually that race, but that you count as that race for any reason related to that additional race.
Why do we care what the PFS house rules are?
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As a GM my ruling would probably be that you must be in your base form. This goes in line with the rules for Change Shape it's self. I'd say this would be one of the things disabled while in your human form. Actually, it falls in line with the rules for Polymorph and similar spells. Fox Shape would be an Extraordinary (Ex) ability. And in human form those and supernatural abilities that aren't class abilities get disabled.
When Kahel takes her human form she loses Agile, Bite, and Low Light Vision. She keeps Fast Shifter because that modifies her Change Shape ability it's self. And she keeps Change Shape because, well duh, she's USING it. If she had fox shape, I'd expect that gets disabled in human form too.
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Hopefully not, because that has nothing to do with the 'Kitsune Form', it's simply referencing the base creature: A Kitsune.
His argument was, that the feat only allows to change from "kitsune form" into "fox form" thus a human cannot use it to change into a fox, since he is in "human form" - if he follows this line of thought, a kitsune in "human form" must change to "kitsune form" first, before the feat allows the change to "fox form."
I can argue why the fox form might work (rp wise), so I'd only be concerned about a potential change in power.
But, if we assume that kitsune und human are equal, than this feat does not give a human a greater benefit than a kitsune.
So, while I don't think that it was intended, I cannot see why one shouldn't be able to do it.
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But rules as written, which is what the initial question had been about, it doesn't add a new form to an existing shapeshifting ability. It adds a NEW ability to shapeshift into a fox. If a kitsune player had somehow traded away their ability to use change shape for a different racial trait (not that they can) they'd still be able to take Fox Shape. And they could still use it to become a fox, in addition to their other forms.
Change Shape isn't a requirement to use fox shape, as the feat is written.
As a game master it's your right to decide on a house rule saying that you need Change Shape to take and use the feat. But that would be a house rule, not Rules As Written.
Pathfinder Society is a whole other ball of wax, and I'd want an official ruling there before allowing it for a human with racial heritage: kitsune. I personally don't see a problem with it, but I'd want to make sure I'm not approving something that the PFS rules say isn't allowed.
Picking up a feat later on if a ruling comes out that allows it is much less of a headache then having to retrain a feat because a ruling came out saying you never should have been allowed to take it.
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But at no point does it that it alters a pre-existing anything.
By your interpretation. By my interpretation it does.
This is a customer service issue.
We couldn't disagree more. In my mind this is a GM RAW interpretation issue.
As a game master it's your right to decide on a house rule saying that you need Change Shape to take and use the feat. But that would be a house rule, not Rules As Written.
As a game master you are in charge of what the rules say. You may also house rule to alter how the rules work, but we are talking about RAW in this thread. RAW is up to the GM.