FAQ: How does Stacking work?

[Avoron]

They might have been thinking of the Dual-Cursed Oracle Misfortune revelation, which works as implied.

Misfortune (Ex) wrote:

At 1st level, as an immediate action, you can force a creature within 30 feet to reroll any one d20 roll that it has just made before the results of the roll are revealed. The creature must take the result of the reroll, even if it’s worse than the original roll. Once a creature has suffered from your misfortune, it cannot be the target of this revelation again for 1 day.

[N N 959]

Avoron wrote:

They might have been thinking of the Dual-Cursed Oracle Misfortune revelation, which works as implied.

Misfortune (Ex) wrote:

At 1st level, as an immediate action, you can force a creature within 30 feet to reroll any one d20 roll that it has just made before the results of the roll are revealed. The creature must take the result of the reroll, even if it’s worse than the original roll. Once a creature has suffered from your misfortune, it cannot be the target of this revelation again for 1 day.

Yes, I meant the Oracle ability. No, it's not working as implied. Using it on an ally is using it as it is not implied. It's called "misfortune." The hex uses the term "suffer." Even worse, it's common practice for Oracles to use this on themselves. The next hex is called "Fortune" and specifically let's the player reroll their own d20. It would make no sense for the devs to create Fortune if they intend Misfortune to do the same thing.

[Shoga]

This thread has reminded me of a question I had when I first created my Xeph Kensai/Bladebound Magus. I understand that this thread was to define the rules for spells vs spells but now I am wondering about how the effects of spells vs Class abilities stack.

Kensai abilities:

Perfect Strike (Ex): At 4th level, when a kensai hits with his chosen weapon, he can spend 1 point from his arcane pool in order to maximize his weapon damage. Don’t roll for damage—the weapon deals maximum damage. This affects only the weapon’s base damage dice, not additional
damage from sneak attack, magical weapon properties,spellstrike, or critical hits. If the kensai confirms a critical hit, he can instead spend 2 points from his arcane pool to increase his weapon’s critical multiplier by 1. This ability replaces spell recall.

Weapon Mastery (Ex): At 20th level, a kensai gains weapon mastery with his favored weapon, as the fighter class ability. This ability replaces true magus.

From the Magus abilities, I use 1 Arcane Pool to enhance my sword with the Keen weapon enhancement.

I understand these abilities will stack but would they stack with spells that effect them too (Other than the obvious Keen enhancement)?

And what spell that's on the Magus' spell list that I could use to increase my critical multiplier?

[Skylancer4]

Generally speaking stacking isn't just limited to spells/effects. Even in 3.5 stacking was reduced from 3.0. It is just that "powerful" in many cases.

Most abilities that do "stack" something are typically worded to not work with others that do the same thing. This is the easy part, as they are so regulated or focused in effect, when written they know exactly how they will be used. With spells it gets significantly more tricky, as there are just so many of them, you can't be 100% what they will be interacting with.

[Avoron]

N N 959 wrote:

Avoron wrote:

They might have been thinking of the Dual-Cursed Oracle Misfortune revelation, which works as implied.

Misfortune (Ex) wrote:

At 1st level, as an immediate action, you can force a creature within 30 feet to reroll any one d20 roll that it has just made before the results of the roll are revealed. The creature must take the result of the reroll, even if it’s worse than the original roll. Once a creature has suffered from your misfortune, it cannot be the target of this revelation again for 1 day.

Yes, I meant the Oracle ability. No, it's not working as implied. Using it on an ally is using it as it is not implied. It's called "misfortune." The hex uses the term "suffer." Even worse, it's common practice for Oracles to use this on themselves. The next hex is called "Fortune" and specifically let's the player reroll their own d20. It would make no sense for the devs to create Fortune if they intend Misfortune to do the same thing.

I was just telling Cevah that this form of Misfortune worked as you implied it did.

I can definitely see a GM ruling that it doesn't work at their table, as long as they inform their players ahead of time. Because even though it does go against the theme of the ability, the designers have had an errata and over four years of FAQs in which to change it if they saw a need to.

[Shoga]

After revisiting the Keen special ability and noting its specified "does not stack with other" notation, makes me want to ask.

1) If I have the Keen special ability, can I use the Kensai Perfect Strike ability to increase the multiplier by one?

2) at 20th level, The Kensai cap ability increases the Critical Multiplier of my focus weapon by one. Would this preclude using the keen weapon quality and make the Kensai Perfect Strike ability to increase the multiplier useless?

[N N 959]

Avoron wrote:

Because even though it does go against the theme of the ability, the designers have had an errata and over four years of FAQs in which to change it if they saw a need to.

It's taken that long to change many things in the game. Just because they fail to address this doesn't mean they are in support of it. Remember, every GM can house rule anything they want and because of that, there is very little impetus on Paizo to address some of these misinterpretations. Paizo doesn't make money issuing FAQs, they lose money. Paizo makes money issuing new content. The only place FAQ and Errata are truly important is PFS and I am skeptical PFS makes up the majority of the player base.

[Avoron]

Yeah. That's why I have no problem with GMs changing it, as long as they tell their players ahead of time.
We have so many unclear rules, why waste time worrying about rules that are clear? Just make a house rule or don't.

[Sebastian Hirsch]

Mark Seifter wrote:

The question for the FAQ is

Quote:

"Does not stack with" and spells with effects other than bonuses: What does it mean if a spell tells me it doesn’t stack with another spell or "similar effects" if some of the effects aren't bonuses?

Everything else in the FAQ is answering that question. So if you don't have a non-bonus telling you it "does not stack with" something else, you don't apply the FAQ. This thread's discussion is about the stacking issue and not just aspect (which does also have its own independent issues). This FAQ, for example, makes it so that you can definitively have up both fervor and haste and take the different effects or overlap (without stacking) the similar effects, whereas before some GMs has you pick one spell or the other entirely. And in case there are other similar wordings before or are new ones later that leave people perplexed.

When I first read the FAQ the blessing of fervor bit, it sounded, like you could not gain/choose the +2 attack bonus from blessing of fervor, when you have haste active. Obviously those two effects aren't supposed to stack, but some GMs might interpret that sentence to mean, that you can't even choose that particular option.

[Skylancer4]

I haven't looked, but I believe typically ongoing damage takes effect at the beginning of your turn. So if you start your turn in lava, you would not take damage on the new turn?