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Ok guys, I need help with a ruling. I'm making a Dhampir Cleric that takes 3 levels in Unchained Rogue. I want to use the Elven Branched Spear for weapon finesse and 1.5x Dex to damage, and the other benefits of the weapon. As a Cleric/Rogue I don't have any martial proficiencies. At level 2 I was able to afford a Cracked White Opalescent Stone for 1500GP and keyed it to the Elven Branched Spear which gives me familiarity (counts as martial weapon). My level 2 archetype is the Swashbuckler Rogue from APG. The level 1 ability allows me to give myself proficiency with any martial weapon. I very clearly think these two things work in tandem, of course not working if I were to lose or be removed of the ioun stone. However when I ran it past my GM he said he rules no on them working, but would possibly change his mind if others on the forum agreed with me. I'm curious what everyone else thinks. My main argument is in the RAW interpretation of "weapon familiarity" and ioun stones. Elves in my situation could do it due to their racial weapon familiarity and to my knowledge the ioun stone grants that same thing but for a specific keyed weapon. Additionally ioun stones that affect ability modifiers are considered permanent after the first 24 hours and I don't think this should be treated any different, my familiarity with the spear would be permanent after the first 24 hours.
Please let me know what you think and I'll post the two rules in question below.
Cracked Opalescent White Pyramid Ioun Stone:
The stone grants the wearer weapon familiarity with the keyed weapon (it is treated as a martial weapon for him).
Swashbuckler Martial Training:
At 1st level, the swashbuckler may select one martial weapon to add to her list of weapon proficiencies. In addition, she may take the combat trick rogue talent up to two times. This ability replaces trapfinding.
First I will point out this does seem to be a general rules question, and thus would be better posted in the rules forum. I know you are asking specifically for PFS, but we use the same rules as such this wouldn't be a PFS specific ruling but a general game ruling.
That being said...
I don't believe these would work together. Swashbuckler Martial Training says to "select one martial weapon". The Elven Branched Spear is not a martial weapon. You may be treating it as one due to other abilities, but it is not actually one.
I can see how others might allow it, and I don't believe that is a bad interpretation, it just isn't how I would read it.
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First I will point out this does seem to be a general rules question, and thus would be better posted in the rules forum. I know you are asking specifically for PFS, but we use the same rules as such this wouldn't be a PFS specific ruling but a general game ruling.
That being said...
I don't believe these would work together. Swashbuckler Martial Training says to "select one martial weapon". The Elven Branched Spear is not a martial weapon. You may be treating it as one due to other abilities, but it is not actually one.
I can see how others might allow it, and I don't believe that is a bad interpretation, it just isn't how I would read it.
under what circumstances would you ever use the ability to treat something as a martial weapon then?
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under what circumstances would you ever use the ability to treat something as a martial weapon then?
On a character who already gets all martial weapon profs, to make an exotic weapon fall under that category for you.
A dwarf swashbuckler rogue might treat dwarven waraxes as martial weapons, but they remain exotic weapons. So this combo does not quite work.
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under what circumstances would you ever use the ability to treat something as a martial weapon then?First I will point out this does seem to be a general rules question, and thus would be better posted in the rules forum. I know you are asking specifically for PFS, but we use the same rules as such this wouldn't be a PFS specific ruling but a general game ruling.
That being said...
I don't believe these would work together. Swashbuckler Martial Training says to "select one martial weapon". The Elven Branched Spear is not a martial weapon. You may be treating it as one due to other abilities, but it is not actually one.
I can see how others might allow it, and I don't believe that is a bad interpretation, it just isn't how I would read it.
Well the classic case is when you have proficiency with all martial weapons of course. I.e. dwarf fighter picking up anything with "dwarven" printed on it.
This one... It's an order of operations thing. If you take the ioun stone and treat the EBS as a martial weapon, you should then be able to pick it as "your one martial weapon to be proficient in". If you lose the ioun stone the weapon choice becomes illegal though until you regain the ioun stone.
I think it works but I've always felt bad about using magic items to satisfy class/feat prerequisites.
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I don't really see the difference between someone with all martial weapons and select one martial weapon if the point is to make it a martial weapon.
First I will point out this does seem to be a general rules question, and thus would be better posted in the rules forum. I know you are asking specifically for PFS, but we use the same rules as such this wouldn't be a PFS specific ruling but a general game ruling.
If it needs to get punted over to general rules, that's fine. I posted here because he said he'd reconsider if I got other VL/VC's that said yes. I just assumed there were more around the PFS Rules forum than the general rules forum.
I don't believe these would work together. Swashbuckler Martial Training says to "select one martial weapon". The Elven Branched Spear is not a martial weapon. You may be treating it as one due to other abilities, but it is not actually one.
So if an Elven wizard wanted to use an Elven Branched Spear would they take Martial Weapon Proficiency or Exotic? I realize both feats achieve the same result, but if Martial Weapon Proficiency would also work, then I again don't see why this combo doesn't work. Being "treated" as a martial weapon I believe also means it now falls under the Martial Weapon chart as opposed to the Exotic Weapon chart.
So, by that GM's logic my APG elven swashbuckler rogue (that I took to seeker level in PFS and no GM so much as raised an eyebrow at) was done incorrectly because as an elf I treated the elven curveblade as a martial weapon and used it as the weapon I chose for the AT?
No, I brought that up and he said that would work because the Elves permanently treat it as a martial weapon. which is where I get hung up.
Weapon Familiarity: Elves are proficient with longbows (including composite longbows), longswords, rapiers, and shortbows (including composite shortbows), and treat any weapon with the word "elven" in its name as a martial weapon.
Cracked Opalescent White Pyramid Ioun Stone:
The stone grants the wearer weapon familiarity with the keyed weapon (it is treated as a martial weapon for him).
Emphasis mine. Due to the wording being near identical and ioun stone modifiers being considered permanent unless removed I have a hard time figuring out why this wouldn't work. He's a fair VL and friend, but I definitely disagree with him on this.
I would rule no. It says select one martial weapon and it's not a martial.
Had I reviewed the seeker rogue using the ECB I would have ruled it as illegal as well.
Issue with that rogue, how many times was it actually reviewed? GM's usually assume that players are doing things legal, so when they see something they figure that there's some combo that they aren't aware of and don't bother reviewing everything of a character to make sure it's legal. Happened recently at my local lodge, a rogue made it to lv5 with an illegal feat from lv1 that the VL, VC, and 2 VA's never noticed until one started reviewing the feat for their next character. Just assumed that the player making his 4th character knew how additional resources worked so we didn't bother to check that the feat was legal.
Of my 13 characters, with 1 in eyes and another retired, I've had 1 character review, and the character was at lv9 at the time.
SO a claim that just because no GM bothered to look at it and tell you were wrong doesn't mean that all the GM's wouldn't have batted an eye had they actually reviewed it and knew that nothing was happening.
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It IS a martial weapon with respect to the character. So as long as its an option that goes through the character it's good. If it was an enchant that can go on a martial weapon (is there even such a thing?) then it wouldn't.
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I'm pretty sure it would work. If something is a martial weapon for you[i], you can take it as a choice when selecting a martial weapon.
The "other cases" where it doesn't work are fundamentally different cases. For example, a Swashbuckler (the class, not the rogue archetype) gains the benefits of Weapon Finesse with one-handed piercing weapons. That doesn't mean he can put an Agile enchantment on a heavy pick however, because [i]in itself the heavy pick isn't a finesseable weapon.
The best FAQ'ed case of "a thing acting as another thing" is mithral armor: FAQ. It makes it clear that for you it's a step lighter so you can use class abilities that require a lighter armor. But in itself, it's still the normal type, so it can't be enchanted with things that require a heavier armor.
The Ioun Stone changes "the object for me", and the Swashbuckler Rogue archetype cares about "the object for me". So it works.