| Kanul |
The Watersinger Bard
At 1st level, a watersinger can use bardic performance to manipulate and control the shape of water within 30 feet. A successful Perform check allows the bard to animate and control a 5-foot-cube of water. The watersinger can command the water to take various forms, bend, rise, fall, or sustain a shape, and can make it support weight as if it were solid ice. For example, the watersinger could create a pillar of water (to provide cover), ladder, channel, bridge, stairs, slide, and so on. The manipulated water is as slippery as normal ice. This ability cannot create forms more fragile or complex than what could be carved in normal ice. While under the bard's control, the water has hardness 0 and 3 hit points per inch of thickness. At level 3, the manipulated water gains hardness 1, and this increases by +1 for every 3 bard levels beyond that. At 5th, 10th, 15th, and 20th level, the volume affected increases by an additional 5-foot cube (these cubes must be adjacent to each other). The manipulated water retains its shape for 1 round after the bard stops spending bardic performance rounds to maintain it.
At 3rd level, the watersinger can spend 1 round of bardic performance to command any water he is currently manipulating with his watersong performance to lash out and strike an opponent with a slam attack. The watersinger uses his base attack bonus and Charisma bonus to make this attack, and deals 1d6 points of bludgeoning damage plus his Charisma bonus. The attack can originate from any square of water the bard is manipulating, and the water can get a flanking bonus or help a combatant get one, but cannot make attacks of opportunity. The water can make multiple attacks per round if your base attack bonus allows you to do so. At 10th level, the water's slam damage increases to 1d8 points and the water gains a reach of 10 feet. At 15th level, the water's slam damage increases to 2d6 points. At 20th level, the water's slam damage increases to 2d8 points.
I played this bard today at my local game store and the table ended up in a discussion regarding how these abilities functioned.
My knowledge of Pathfinder is limited, so I do not know of many of the other abilities and rules out there. Hopefully the community can shed some light on this because it has me stumped. Links to any rulings on similar abilities or dev/author posts regarding this archetype would be very much appreciated.
Here are some of the topics that came up as well as a few of my own questions:
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Questions
1. What are the Perform DCs for Watersong? Or is the ability ensuring you are not under any conditions that would prevent the visual/aural component of a Bardic Performance?
2. What does the action sequence look like to use Watersong? Is it an action (Standard/Move/Swift) to start the Bardic Performance and then another Standard Action to manipulate the water? Or can you manipulate the water as soon as you start the Bardic Performance?
3. Can you MOVE the water being manipulated by Watersong?
Comment: I imagine if you can manipulate it into complex shapes, you have enough control to move it around like a flaming sphere or a spiritual weapon. Though, the ability does list extra reach for the water so maybe it has to be stationary?
4. What feats affect Waterstrike? Power Attack, Deadly Aim, Improved Natural Attack, Weapon Focus, etc.
Comment: The ability seems to function like Spiritual Weapon, so it could be case that it does not receive any benefits. If so, spending 2 rounds of Bardic Performance for Shortbow damage per round doesn't sound impressive. IF you can move the water, however, I could see utility in providing the rogue a flanking buddy or messing with a caster.
5. Does Waterstrike qualify as a melee attack for purposes of combat maneuvers?
Comment: The ability says Waterstrike deals a "slam attack" instead of saying it deals bludgeoning damage. Perhaps there was intent in that? Or maybe it's just flavor for bludgeoning damage?
6. Would Lingering Performance work with Watersong?
Comment:
I'm imagining something like the following situation:
Turn 1: Start Performance then End Performance
Turn 2: Manipulate Water or Waterstrike
Turn 3: Manipulate water or Waterstrike
Turn 4: Go to Turn 1.
Repeat ad infinitum.
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Thanks for reading!
| Unefsylord |
This thread is kind of old, but I just started playing a watersinger recently and wanted to comment:
1. What are the Perform DCs for Watersong? Or is the ability ensuring you are not under any conditions that would prevent the visual/aural component of a Bardic Performance?
What my GM and I ended up agreeing on was that the perform check would be the craft DC if I intended on making a complex object (e.g. a mechanical trap). As well as possibly save DCs when using the water to attack in non-melee ways, such as trying to capture someone in a cube of water. Don't know if the DCs would be too high this way in the long run, but early level it's usually massive success or abysmal failure.
2. What does the action sequence look like to use Watersong? Is it an action (Standard/Move/Swift) to start the Bardic Performance and then another Standard Action to manipulate the water? Or can you manipulate the water as soon as you start the Bardic Performance?
My GM and I decided here that manipulating/shaping the water was the equivalent of starting a new bardic performance. So at higher levels you could manipulate and change shape up to 3 times a round (using up a standard, move, and swift action)
3. Can you MOVE the water being manipulated by Watersong?Comment: I imagine if you can manipulate it into complex shapes, you have enough control to move it around like a flaming sphere or a spiritual weapon. Though, the ability does list extra reach for the water so maybe it has to be stationary?
We lumped this in with manipulating/shaping the water, so that moving the water was a part of the manipulation. However, you'd still be restricted to only being able to manipulate water in a given 5ft cube.
4. What feats affect Waterstrike? Power Attack, Deadly Aim, Improved Natural Attack, Weapon Focus, etc.Comment: The ability seems to function like Spiritual Weapon, so it could be case that it does not receive any benefits. If so, spending 2 rounds of Bardic Performance for Shortbow damage per round doesn't sound impressive. IF you can move the water, however, I could see utility in providing the rogue a flanking buddy or messing with a caster.
This one was a tough one and we haven't played it out enough to know for sure what would work best yet. We ended up deciding that it was a melee attack as if the bard was making the attack, just from a different location. So power attack, improved natural attack, and weapon focus would apply, deadly aim would not.
5. Does Waterstrike qualify as a melee attack for purposes of combat maneuvers?Comment: The ability says Waterstrike deals a "slam attack" instead of saying it deals bludgeoning damage. Perhaps there was intent in that? Or maybe it's just flavor for bludgeoning damage?
My GM decided to do that in the sense that any Combat Maneuver that can take the place of a melee attack can be swapped for one of the slam attacks. Combat Maneuvers that require a standard action can't.
6. Would Lingering Performance work with Watersong?Comment:
I'm imagining something like the following situation:
Turn 1: Start Performance then End Performance
Turn 2: Manipulate Water or Waterstrike
Turn 3: Manipulate water or Waterstrike
Turn 4: Go to Turn 1.
Repeat ad infinitum.
I would go with that they stack, but once you end your performance, you can't change any decisions about the water. This falls under the fact that manipulating the water is whatever the action is for the performance. So you can't quite get 4 rounds of bardic music for 1 round. But I would argue that you could somewhat get away with manipulating two cubes in that one cube of water would persist even if you started a new performance because unlike lingering performance, the performance isn't actually happening anymore, the water merely retains its shape.