They all do bludgeoning and have the water trait. Only the cantrip doesn't benefit from blood magic.
|
You get the blood magic benefit whenever you cast your bloodline focus spell or cast one of your granted spells using a spell slot (so everything on the list that's not produce flame).
All Blood Magic benefits either do something to a target or let you give yourself a buff, which makes sense* since you wouldn't want to combine a friendly Blood Magic effect with an unfriendly spell or vice versa. You don't want to cast resist energy on an ally and also blast them probably, so you take the Intimidation bonus instead. If you're using a Blood Magic effect against an enemy, it only works if you hit/they fail the save. If it's an area spell, it only affects one target.
All of your granted spells can get the extra damage if you choose. The Elemental Bloodline is special because it also alters how some of your spells work, changing their damage types. These two things work independently of each other. Looking at the list, all of the spells that target enemies seem to have the * so you'll probably add the damage together every time you use it, but you theoretically could damage the target of some of the others; the actual rules don't restrict it to those spells.
The note on combining damage is just so you don't do 2d6 damage for burning hands, and also 1 damage separately. Lots of things that deal multiple instances of damage at the same time tell you to combine them for weaknesses and resistances.
|
Paizo really should not have been lazy about creating specialize spell lists for each elemental type. In the space taken up by the "Elemental Type" paragraph, they could have printed granted spells for each element! I created my own lists:
Elemental Sorcerers: Replace their listed Granted Spells with the following, chosen by their Element Type
Fire: Cantrip: Produce Flame 1st: Burning Hands 2nd: Flaming Sphere 3rd: Fireball 4th: Wall of Fire 5th: Elemental Form 6th: Fire Seeds 7th: Fiery Body 8th: Prismatic Wall 9th: Storm of Vengeance
Air: Cantrip: Electric Arc 1st: Gust of Wind 2nd: Obscuring Mist 3rd: Wall of Wind 4th: Gaseous Form 5th: Cloudkill 6th: Chain Lightning 7th: Reverse Gravity 8th: Wind Walk 9th: Storm of Vengeance
Earth: Cantrip: Telekinetic Projectile 1st: Shillelagh 2nd: Acid Arrow 3rd: Meld Into Stone 4th: Shape Stone 5th: Wall of Stone 6th: Flesh to Stone 7th: Volcanic Eruption 8th: Earthquake 9th: Storm of Vengeance
Water: Cantrip: Ray of Frost 1st: Hydraulic Push 2nd: Water Breathing 3rd: Feet to Fins 4th: Hydraulic Torrent 5th: Wall of Ice 6th: Repulsion 7th: Energy Aegis 8th: Polar Ray 9th: Storm of Vengeance
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
They could have at least used Cold or Acid and Electric or Sonic Damage instead of Bludgeoning for 3 of the 4 Elements. As is, there are really only 2 Elemenal Sorcerers. Fire and not Fire. Yes you add your Elemental Trait to the Spells, but that matters so rarely as to be statistically insignificant.
|
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
In your effort not to be "lazy", Samurai, you've reduced the balance between the elemental types.
You've also picked out a few spells that you think fit the theme of the earth and water elements that myself, and probably some others, don't think fit that theme.
I could only use the spells the game provided me, so they may not be a perfect fit, but I thought it was better than a bunch of fire spells that just say change the damage to bludgeoning. If I were writing the book, I would have tried to create at least 1 spell of each level for each element to assist with the balance. Still, I tried to give each type at least a few attack spells and defensive spells, though the levels they get them and how effective they are does vary.
That said, why is the Elemental Sorcerer the only one supposedly able to create so many of these spells that change the damage type? If a Wizard (the so-called master of arcane magic) is facing a fire elemental, why can't he be able to change his burning hands and fireballs into water too? Sure, it may cost him 1 action to apply a meta-magic feat while the sorcerer can do it automatically, but it should still be possible, at least with the feat, shouldn't it?
Oh, and 1 more thing, Produce Flame causes persistent fire damage on a critical hit, what does persistent damage "bludgeoning" elemental damage look like? The air/water/earth that you hit them with several rounds ago keeps attacking the creature on it's own somehow?
|
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
The Elemental Sorcerer can't change the damage types. A character having a slightly different version of a spell is way different from changing it on the fly. The latter is a major increase in versatility; the former actually reduces the Elemental Sorcerer's versatility, since they're all the same type.
A metamagic Feat to change a spell's damage type sounds reasonable, though.
I do have to agree about produce flame. That's an odd fit (although "somehow" is a silly criticism when it magically hit the creature on its own to begin with).
If one likens the persistent damage to fire, then one can imagine the element remains active, dancing around, spreading, etc. Since yes, the spell/element is actively damaging them on future rounds.
I prefer the balance of using the same spells, finding no issue with bludgeoning since that does fit the elements involved. They bludgeon (at least in PF2 now that energy & elements have more separation). That makes them mechanically similar, yet the flavor remains distinct as do special circumstances.
|
Oh, and 1 more thing, Produce Flame causes persistent fire damage on a critical hit, what does persistent damage "bludgeoning" elemental damage look like? The air/water/earth that you hit them with several rounds ago keeps attacking the creature on it's own somehow?
Seems most visually appropriate with air, a dancing dust devil whirling around the target, damaging them again on following rounds, but the whirling damaging manifestation could as easily be a swarm of rocks, or tiny waterspout, or, a crushing stony, icy, or even super-high-pressure watery coating over the lower limbs or torso (such that they don't have any effect other than the persistent damage, like suffocating or entangling the target).
Even easier if it's doing elemental/energy type damage (I don't have the book in front of me, so I'm not sure). Persistent acid, electricity or cold is not really any more unusual than persistent fire.
|
|
Oh, and 1 more thing, Produce Flame causes persistent fire damage on a critical hit, what does persistent damage "bludgeoning" elemental damage look like? The air/water/earth that you hit them with several rounds ago keeps attacking the creature on it's own somehow?Seems most visually appropriate with air, a dancing dust devil whirling around the target, damaging them again on following rounds, but the whirling damaging manifestation could as easily be a swarm of rocks, or tiny waterspout, or, a crushing stony, icy, or even super-high-pressure watery coating over the lower limbs or torso (such that they don't have any effect other than the persistent damage, like suffocating or entangling the target).
Even easier if it's doing elemental/energy type damage (I don't have the book in front of me, so I'm not sure). Persistent acid, electricity or cold is not really any more unusual than persistent fire.
No, it doesn't, and that's another issue I have with it. It replaces Fire with Bludgeoning, it doesn't add cold, acid, electricity, or anything else.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
They could have at least used Cold or Acid and Electric or Sonic Damage instead of Bludgeoning for 3 of the 4 Elements. As is, there are really only 2 Elemenal Sorcerers. Fire and not Fire. Yes you add your Elemental Trait to the Spells, but that matters so rarely as to be statistically insignificant.
I'm personally really glad they didn't go that route. I want to play a water sorcerer, not an ice sorcerer. Bludgeoning helps with that fantasy a lot. Though if a player came to me and wanted to play a cold/electric/etc sorcerer, I'd let them just change the damage type. But I'm happy the default is fire or bludgeoning.
They could have at least used Cold or Acid and Electric or Sonic Damage instead of Bludgeoning for 3 of the 4 Elements. As is, there are really only 2 Elemenal Sorcerers. Fire and not Fire. Yes you add your Elemental Trait to the Spells, but that matters so rarely as to be statistically insignificant.I'm personally really glad they didn't go that route. I want to play a water sorcerer, not an ice sorcerer. Bludgeoning helps with that fantasy a lot. Though if a player came to me and wanted to play a cold/electric/etc sorcerer, I'd let them just change the damage type. But I'm happy the default is fire or bludgeoning.
That's great, but you're not playing a Water Sorcerer. You're playing a Bludgeoning Sorcerer. Just like all the people who think they are playing Air and Earth Sorcerers. They are all the same. That's boring.
I can see Bludgeoning working for Water & Earth, but I wish they'd gone with Slashing Damage for air. Cutting blades of wind is a cool trope.
I mean, either they add three extra elemental types that will have not much use compared to the traditional ones - or they use bludgeoning to indicate the method by which it does damage, which is "hitting hard and good".
Do agree on slashing for wind though. Slashing or bludgeoning would be fun.