Don't be so harsh on someone for saying they were shaken by a change. It isn't fair to belittle their play experience or their feedback to the campaign and the game as a whole. To me these changes do matter and keep happening in significant enough fashions that I feel my game experience suffered and I know many other people feel the same way....and many of us feel that various changes were reasonable, obvious, and/or not terribly significant. We thus find the incessant caterwauling over seeming minutiae in and of itself detracting from the game experience for no good purpose.
Everyone has their own perspective.
Wow.
Venture-Captain, Germany—Bavaria
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So it seems this is a non-issue for the majority of us?
Well, worst case scenario, your monk/druid either needs to roll relatively well on Use magic device (or have someone else do it) or buy a couple of potions, just in case. Even the iconic hunter uses potions of mage armor.
Developer
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Found this thread googling to see if anyone else had this problem. I bought and used the ring for the first time today in my local PFS group and I'm in the process of writing an apology tomy GM, sell it and never look back. I play a kitsune Snakebite Brawler 1/Scout Unchained Rogue 6. The disadvantages of not being able to flank or reach are almost nill with the increased speed, ignoring difficult terrain and allied squares by flying over them during a charge and Snake Style being used to dodge incoming AoOs I might provoke. Which is all further moot by the fact such enormous table variation exists given the polymorph subschool description regarding what abilities are retained. I hate putting GMs in a position where they gotta disappoint a player like that, but I couldn't disagree that it was goofy for my tiny bird to attack for 1d2+10d6+17.
Getting +5 to hit, +5 to AC and +2 to damage is pretty ridiculous given the other skill and tactical bonuses conferred by the ring. Even the "stuck for 10 minutes" caveat mentioned in the first post is negated by the fact I'm a kitsune.
When I first bought it from my new book I thought I just hit gold. "This is the perfect item for my build. Its not even expensive; I must just be lucky to have this combination of classes and race that fit so perfectly with it". But alas, it puts a burden on the GM (who has to decide between disappointing his player or letting him have the ridiculous bonuses) and feels far too cheap (in terms of GP) for the bonuses it conveys.
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A scout can treat their target as flat-footed (for purposes of sneak attack) if they charge. The rest is from Sap Master and Body Wraps of Mighty Strikes (Holy).
The fact flying opens up a whole new dimension for chargers only adds to how potentially overpowered the item is for this subset of characters. Toss in Charging Stag Style (1 level of Master of Many Styles) and Branch Pounce and you can add another 19d6 damage to your attacks by taking 18 falling damage in addition to ignoring the Z axis when calculating your distance to your charge target (with the 1,000 GP investment of Cat Boots).
Even if you ignore the Sneak Attack in the build, this is completely doable at level 3 (although painful without damage reduction). It is dependent, of course, on seeing your target from and having 200 feet of room to fly in.
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scouts count the target as flat footed if they move more than 10 feet or charge
looks like it might also be a sap adept / sap master build
It is. And this item so easily mitigates all of the weaknesses of the character while itself having its weaknesses minimized that its ridiculous. The only potential backdraws are taking the AoO (Snake Style) and not being able to easily parry without reach (If you get Snake Fang). And some GMs may be leniant enough to let you parry by attacking the body-part that tried to attack you! Whereas others may not even let you sneak attack or snake style in bird form.
Its far too much variation for organized play. While the same level of variation is still possible for a monk/rogue/whatever via wands, scrolls and more expensive items, having an item this cheap do so much feels...wrong.
Admittedly, Feather Token (Tree) can end plenty of encounters for less than 1,000 gold, but its a one-time use only item.
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Body Wraps of Mighty Strikes are an activated per round item which you can not activate while polymorphed.
In this form your base fly speed is 40. When you charge you can move up to twice your speed which is 80. You will need at least 60 more movement to your base before you can fully benefit from branch pounce. Even after all this you are strictly limited by the amount of room you have to charge as you said.
Snake Style is a feat not a class feature and is therefore not subject to the "You also lose any class features that depend upon form, but those that allow you to add features still function" rule. I don't think there should be variation here.
Sneak Attack is a class feature and I would argue it is not dependent on form but the GM variation is written into the rules of polymorph stating "While most of these should be obvious, the GM is the final arbiter of what abilities depend on form and are lost when a new form is assumed" making this unavoidable for all polymorph effects.
These two abilities are not an issue specific to the ring but a polymorph rules issue.
Snake Style and Snake Fang also have nothing to do with parrying. One lets you make a sense motive check for your AC as an immediate action while the other gives you an AoO if you are missed. If you hit with that attack you can make an additional attack as an immediate action. That person would need to be in range for you to make an attack and of course you can not use both immediate actions on the same turn.
The build, at least with the ring, is not doable at level 3 either. You must have 18 fame before purchasing it meaning you can get it at level 4 by spending 2/3rds of your wealth by level.
I'm going to disagree that this ring was the cause of the problems experienced at the table more than a misunderstanding about polymorphing and size changes in general would.
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Owner - D20 Hobbies
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I'm going to disagree that this ring was the cause of the problems experienced at the table more than a misunderstanding about polymorphing and size changes in general would.
It seems this entire threat has been a list of misunderstandings of the rules, charge, polymorph, and more.
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Except this part which is correct is still a lot for the price:
Getting +5 to hit, +5 to AC and +2 to damage is pretty ridiculous given the other skill and tactical bonuses conferred by the ring. Even the "stuck for 10 minutes" caveat mentioned in the first post is negated by the fact I'm a kitsune.
And isn't even close to the full abilities of the ring.
And no being stuck in bird form isn't a detractor when you want to be in bird form for all the benefits.
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Isn't the bird's attack a beak (natural weapon)? How is an Unchained Rogue getting Dex to Damage on that? Are they taking Improved Unarmed Strike and then taking that as their finesse weapon at 3rd?
Yes, or more realistically for a lot of people 4th level 1 monk, then 3 Rogue (which then also gets you to the Fame requirement). Which is what I did for my Tengu who likes to beat things up with his beak (no shape-shifting required)
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Owner - D20 Hobbies
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Except this part which is correct is still a lot for the price:.Getting +5 to hit, +5 to AC and +2 to damage is pretty ridiculous
Which requires feat and wealth investment to be a benefit as opposed to a detriment. Plus I'm not sure how they get +5 to hit, should be +4 and only to those that don't have a feat to become a fox.
In short, if you really want to break the game in half with massively disruptive damage. Raven or fox form are the last in the queue of optimized forms. Standard large wild shape and medium ooze shape are the way to go (600 damage critical in one hit.)
It seems abundantly clear that anyone trying to get this removed are in one of these two situations:
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I hate this item.
Don't take my word for it, though. My advice is to post this item on the Blazing 9 thread over on RPGSS and watch as everyone there tears it to shreds for being woefully underpriced and mechanically strong for its cost.
I would do so myself, but I already know this ring is busted in half.
So just for fun (and some practice), I took the ring and submitted it for critique in that thread. (I made some minor changes too so that I wasn't just wantonly stealing Paizo material).
For anyone not familiar it's the practice item creation thread for RPG Superstar, in which a number of people all look at and create items fror practice for RPG superstar. There are a number of people who comment there from former competitors to 3rd Party Publishers and a number of freelancers
The link for the ring is here
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Except this part which is correct is still a lot for the price:.Getting +5 to hit, +5 to AC and +2 to damage is pretty ridiculous
Which requires feat and wealth investment to be a benefit as opposed to a detriment. Plus I'm not sure how they get +5 to hit, should be +4 and only to those that don't have a feat to become a fox.
In short, if you really want to break the game in half with massively disruptive damage. Raven or fox form are the last in the queue of optimized forms. Standard large wild shape and medium ooze shape are the way to go (600 damage critical in one hit.)
It seems abundantly clear that anyone trying to get this removed are in one of these two situations:
simply haven't seen enough optimized builds
have seen too many people confused about how the rules work.
+1 from height, you're flying take advantage of it.
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as a tiny critter you are in the same square as they are to attack, so don't have a height advantage.
+1 from height, you're flying take advantage of it.
Do you have a reference to that? While I see the argument the only reference I've ever seen is "higher ground" (in the rule books) for the height advantage. If the flying creature is on your head it has higher ground, but is in your square to attack is the one I've seen run. (Mind you it was tiny fey attacking a medium creature)
Some other considerations for height advantage
Does a large creature get height advantage against a medium on flat ground? (No)
Does a medium creature on a mount get height advantage against a medium creature? (Yes) Large? (yes)
Does a Medium creature on a table or chair get hieight advantage against a medium creature? (Yes) Large? (Yes)
At least in the way I've seen it run, it is actually where your feet are relative to each other (that is the ground) that determines height advantage. Though I'd imagine there is a lot of table variation.
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as a tiny critter you are in the same square as they are to attack, so don't have a height advantage.Do you have a reference to that? While I see the argument the only reference I've ever seen is "higher ground" (in the rule books) for the height advantage. If the flying creature is on your head it has higher ground, but is in your square to attack is the one I've seen run. (Mind you it was tiny fey attacking a medium creature)
As a tengu with the Wings feat and having been hit with a Reduce Person spell I've been on the 'downside' of this.
In a different scenario, attacked by Tiny flying creatures they didn't get a height advantage on a character.
Table variation may be at play, but I think two of two situations tends to support the assertion, or a LOT of people don't know what they're doing.
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as a tiny critter you are in the same square as they are to attack, so don't have a height advantage.Do you have a reference to that? While I see the argument the only reference I've ever seen is "higher ground" (in the rule books) for the height advantage. If the flying creature is on your head it has higher ground, but is in your square to attack is the one I've seen run. (Mind you it was tiny fey attacking a medium creature)As a tengu with the Wings feat and having been hit with a Reduce Person spell I've been on the 'downside' of this.
In a different scenario, attacked by Tiny flying creatures they didn't get a height advantage on a character.
Table variation may be at play, but I think two of two situations tends to support the assertion, or a LOT of people don't know what they're doing.
Yeah, sorry was editing while doing other stuff around the house.
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Owner - D20 Hobbies
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Do you have a reference to that?
Does a medium creature on a mount get height advantage against a medium creature? (Yes) Large? (yes)
Does a Medium creature on a table or chair get hieight advantage against a medium creature? (Yes) Large? (Yes)
At least in the way I've seen it run
I think you must be in an area of loosely goosey rules.
All 4 of those are no, since you are not in the square 5 ft off the ground.
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Do you have a reference to that?
Does a medium creature on a mount get height advantage against a medium creature? (Yes) Large? (yes)
Does a Medium creature on a table or chair get hieight advantage against a medium creature? (Yes) Large? (Yes)
At least in the way I've seen it run
I think you must be in an area of loosely goosey rules.
All 4 of those are no, since you are not in the square 5 ft off the ground.
The core rulebooks agrees and disagrees with the both of you on the mounted higher ground rules at least.
When you attack a creature smaller than your mount that is on foot, you get the +1 bonus on melee attacks for being on higher ground
So medium creature on a large mount gets +1 on melee attacks vs a medium or smaller creature, but not vs large or bigger creatures.
Other higher ground rules aren't specified, so that falls to GM/table variation. (Edit: at least none that I could find)
In the case of a table or chair, that would depend on the height of the table or chair. I'd most likely say no to a chair, but yes to the table, provided the creature you are attacking is your size or smaller.
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Do you have a reference to that?
Does a medium creature on a mount get height advantage against a medium creature? (Yes) Large? (yes)
Does a Medium creature on a table or chair get hieight advantage against a medium creature? (Yes) Large? (Yes)
At least in the way I've seen it run
I think you must be in an area of loosely goosey rules.
All 4 of those are no, since you are not in the square 5 ft off the ground.
The core rulebooks agrees and disagrees with the both of you on the mounted higher ground rules at least.
When you attack a creature smaller than your mount that is on foot, you get the +1 bonus on melee attacks for being on higher groundSo medium creature on a large mount gets +1 on melee attacks vs a medium or smaller creature, but not vs large or bigger creatures.
Other higher ground rules aren't specified, so that falls to GM/table variation. (Edit: at least none that I could find)
In the case of a table or chair, that would depend on the height of the table or chair. I'd most likely say no to a chair, but yes to the table, provided the creature you are attacking is your size or smaller.
Thank you.
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There is something about this effect (Tiny creature) that seems to evoke some primal dislike in some people. I think we'd still have this thread if this item was on the high end of the price spectrum (say 12,000 go).
See that's the thing. I don't hate the ring, in fact I think it's a very cool idea and visual. However, the power level of the ring vs. the cost I don't agree with. 12k is much more in the ballpark at least.
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Would you rather have PCs going tiny, which has been an option since the Core Rulebook came out, or the PCs who go huge? I much prefer the tiny PC, which doesn't take up half of some maps. You can do ridiculous damage with any number of builds in Pathfinder. This one has a cheaper option to do so, but so what? There are ways to do this faster spending less money. Namely the small race 3rd level or higher Unchained Rogue using Reduce Person.
Hell, a Combat Reflexes/Greater Trip/Vicious Stomp Monk gets more attacks in a round, by tripping for their first flurry attack, than any other Monk build. Does that make it overpowered or broken compared to other builds? Nope. A Barbarian or any of the archer builds is still going to consistently out DPR this build.
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I, for one, welcome our new avian overlords. The ring is fun and flavorful, and in my highly subjective opinion, it is priced just right for what it does. It's cheap enough so a PC can pick it up before it's too late in their career to actually enjoy their build, and someone who wants it for exclusively roleplay reasons can get it without breaking the bank longterm. It allows a scout rogue to compete with familiars, phantoms, eidolons and wild shape druids. Not surpass them, mind you. My money's still on Darkvision as the make-or-break ability for scouting ahead.
I could see a 50% markup if it was a big deal (it might very well be!) but any more than that and you're punishing the goddess' followers more than the Doombirds who were going to buy it anyway.
So you stacked an archetype from the old rogue with the chassis of the new rogue. Then you added feats that are designed to be used with Saps, and used them with unarmed strikes. Plus feats that are all about open-hand moves in humanoid form, while being a tiny bird. And you deliberately chose to make unarmed strikes while in the form of a tiny bird, despite that being ludicrous.
And then you complain that it's the bird ring that's ludicrous?
Unchained rogues are literally Rogue Plus, meaning they are blessed by sidestepping any possible archetype compatability issues. The Sap Adept line, despite the name, was designed to be used with any weapon type that meets the prerequisite, otherwise they would have specified saps as the only possible weapon. Headbutting is specifically cited within Improved Unarmed Combat.
I understand the surprise: I too was blindsided by the high damage numbers of a Scout Sapmaster at a high level table once. But this is not only well within the function of the rules, but is hardly game brraking compared to other options that are well within the bounds of legal and (and I would say) sensible play. Archery alone can go toe to toe wuth this build without leaning on nonlethal precision damage.
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"I'd like to be as good at my job as other people's class features are". It seems hypocritical to me to set out to do lots of damage in tiny form, regardless of flavour, and then complain when you succeed.
But you're not.
the traditionally scouty classes don't have a whole lot of class features that actually let them scout. What they have is a relatively small bonus to stealth from a class skill (+3) that is also attainable through a trait (+4), a cheap magic item (+5), skill focus (+3 or +6) etc.
The best class feature for stealth is wildshape, and the ring doesn't even come close to that. The ring lets you pick one rather conspicuous form rather than blending in, doesn't let you earth glide for guaranteed cover and escape, doesn't let you keep opposable thumbs to open doors.
This is better than the class features of a rogue for scouting- is an incredibly low bar to cross because the rogue doesn't have a whole lot of class features for scouting.
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Fly skill.
No one has mentioned this at all in this thread. I have the impression that no one has been requiring the "songbird of doom" to make fly checks.
To hover, you need to hit a DC of 15.
Fly is not a class skill of the monk or rogue, so no +3 class skill bonus.
If you fail the fly check by 5 or more, you fall to the ground.
The maneuverability for the raven is average (+0).
So, for any fight where the songbird wants to keep attacking the same target, they have to make that fly check - if they fail, they have to move at least half movement, provoking when leaving and when coming back on their next turn.
In the example on page 1, the Halfling in bird form had a dex of 26, to +8 to dex skills, they would need to roll a 7 or better on a d20. Failing 30% of the time.
If they roll a 1 or 2, they fall to the ground and are prone. Failing 10% of the time.
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Polymorph.
While under the effects of a polymorph spell, you lose all extraordinary and supernatural abilities that depend on your original form (such as keen senses, scent, and darkvision), as well as any natural attacks and movement types possessed by your original form. You also lose any class features that depend upon form, but those that allow you to add features (such as sorcerers that can grow claws) still function.
Bolding to emphasize a point that I think has been missed in a lot of the arguments.
To me, that means that there are several abilities of the monk that are not available to the "songbird of doom".
Core:
Flurry of Blows (Ex)
Stunning Fist (Ex)
Fast Movement (Ex)
Unarmed Strike: ....A monk's attacks can be with fists, elbows, knees, and feet....
Purity of Body (Ex)
Wholeness of Body (Su)
Unchained:
Flurry of Blows (Ex)
Stunning Fist (Ex)
Fast Movement (Ex)
Unarmed Strike (Ex): ....A monk's attacks can be with fists, elbows, knees, and feet....
So, wouldn't the above reduce the songbird to a single attack a round for a regular or an unchained monk, that of the bite, with no increase in damage dice?
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Owner - D20 Hobbies
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@Jean-Marc Comeau, while I agree with your Fly skill comment, we differ on the form comment.
FoB, SF, FM, US, PoB, and WoB don't depend on form.
Things like:
Fey Wings (Su): At 15th level, you can grow insectlike wings from your back and become one size category smaller
Since the Polymorph school leaves it to the GM, I'll be fine sitting at your table nerfed and I won't call you out on the nerf. But it effects all polymorhph abilities from all classes as a nerf.
@Jean-Marc Comeau, while I agree with your Fly skill comment, we differ on the form comment.
To tell you the truth, I am not 100% sold on the form comment myself.
I did want to offer it up as a "table variation" for those that are asking for a ban of the ring. As an option.
I like the flavour of the item and don't think that it is over powered.
But I am not sure how you are seeing the from comment as a nerf to all classes. Are you seeing a lot of polymorphing? Besides Wildshape (where the druid uses the animal attacks)?
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RPG Superstar 2013 Top 8
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Fly skill.
No one has mentioned this at all in this thread. I have the impression that no one has been requiring the "songbird of doom" to make fly checks.
To hover, you need to hit a DC of 15.
Fly is not a class skill of the monk or rogue, so no +3 class skill bonus.
The Fly skill says:
Creatures with a fly speed treat the Fly skill as a class skill.
So if you have ranks in Fly (which you should be able to take since the ring of seven lovely colors gives you a "reliable means of flying every day") then while you have a fly speed you treat the Fly skill as a class skill and gain the +3 class skill bonus.
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I think "abilities that depend on your original form" should be read as, 'abilities which are possible in your original form but not the new form'.
Thus, a polymorph effect like 'Fey Wings' likely wouldn't remove any abilities because you essentially have the same form as before, just smaller and with wings added.
Ring of the Seven Lovely Colors is a whole different thing. Punches, elbow strikes, knee strikes, and kicks are all completely out of the question for a bird... they just don't have the right physical structure. Yes, they can attack with their 'feet', but it is a clawing rather than striking motion... and thus should be treated as a claw natural weapon attack (like other birds). Therefore, I could easily see removing the unarmed strike ability from a monk polymorphed into a bird. Having only bite and claw natural weapon attacks would then also invalidate flurry of blows. Some of the other abilities are more esoteric/harder to tie to physical structure, but those two already eliminate the combat utility of the build.
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Fly skill.
No one has mentioned this at all in this thread. I have the impression that no one has been requiring the "songbird of doom" to make fly checks.
To hover, you need to hit a DC of 15.
Fly is not a class skill of the monk or rogue, so no +3 class skill bonus.The Fly skill says:
Creatures with a fly speed treat the Fly skill as a class skill.So if you have ranks in Fly (which you should be able to take since the ring of seven lovely colors gives you a "reliable means of flying every day") then while you have a fly speed you treat the Fly skill as a class skill and gain the +3 class skill bonus.
I always took that to mean that creatures with a permanent fly skill, not a fly speed granted by a spell or other such temporary effect. Otherwise you have strange effect that it is a class skill only when you are polymorphed - as once you are back to your normal form, you no longer have a fly speed, so no longer qualify for having the skill as a class skill.
I do acknowledge that someone with this ring could put points into the fly skill - but the examples that I have seen have not done so.