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Any time a feysworn is targeted by an effect that would restore her to life (e.g. raise dead or breath of life), she must immediately expend 4 Prestige Points or the effect fails. This expediture covers the drawback of feymarked.
So I'm operating here under the assumption that the expenditure covers the "drawback" of being "held in her living state by only the Eldest's will". You are essentially trading the political currency of four prestige to cover the "favor" you owe the deity.
But doesn't that mean you should pay the 4 Prestige Points when you die, as the deity uses "Ressurection" on you once you die (unless you are in a place where teleportation and planar travel doesn't function). After all, as the Prestige Class is written, you should be able to use the 5th level Planeshift effect to travel from the First World to the Material Plane after you are slain (and bargain with your Deity), right? Or is this not the intended use of this 5th level power?
Of course, this gets extra awkward if you worship Ranalc. Since he's missing.
(And minor quibble: The FAQ mispelled "expenditure".)
Venture-Agent, Nebraska—Omaha
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It's like spending PP on body recovery. You arrange it beforehand. It's a bit of a corner case in which a character does not have the 4 PP during the scenario, and does afterword, but the current wording is more generous in that case - allowing you to pay the cost at raise dead.
Venture-Captain, Washington—Spokane
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Does Raise Dead even work on a Feysworn? They are immediated raised by their deity; Wouldn't you need to pay for a Planeshift instead? And given the class gives you Planeshift 1/day...
Raise Dead, Breath of Life, Resurrection does not work on a Feyzworn. If a Feyzworn dies, it is immediately brought to the First World. Think of the 4 PP as a deal being made with the Feysworn's Eldest to return them to the Material Plane and allow the Raise Dead or Breath of Life to work.
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Does Raise Dead even work on a Feysworn? They are immediated raised by their deity; Wouldn't you need to pay for a Planeshift instead? And given the class gives you Planeshift 1/day...Raise Dead, Breath of Life, Resurrection does not work on a Feyzworn. If a Feyzworn dies, it is immediately brought to the First World. Think of the 4 PP as a deal being made with the Feysworn's Eldest to return them to the Material Plane and allow the Raise Dead or Breath of Life to work.
So we ignore the part of the class ability that says the Eldest teleports you (i.e. your body and gear) to the First World? So in PFS you can't just pay the 4 pp and Planeshift back to the Material Plane?
Of course, Planeshift isn't the most precise teleportation spell. You'd probably have to spend some time running back to the party.
You could argue you'd have to spend some time convincing the fey's deity to let you back, but then Breath of Life wouldn't work which...is used an example of something that does work if you pay the 4 prestige.
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It is confusing because the clarification doesn't say what the "drawback" of the ability is and makes an assumption that people know what it is talking about. We need a clarification for the clarification still.
My assumption is:
Upon death, a feysworn is immediately resurrected and she must immediately expend 4 Prestige Points or the effect fails.
This means you could choose not to pay 4 PP and have some else raise you.
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You managed to word my problem with the ability exactly. I have a feeling the original class didn't intend for PCs to use this ability to auto-ress, and the original class designer didn't have Ranalc in mind when designing that ability.
I think the intention is you can be Raised/Ressurected/Breath of Life'd if you pay 4 Prestige. Your body is no longer teleported away. This does make the 5th level ability rather mediocre in Pathfinder Society Play, but potentially overpowered if it can be used as a 1/day get-out-of-dead-free-card. Then again, if everyone at the table knows you have it, you are probably more likely to die (personal experience with tabletop games). But the way it is worded now has potential for Negative Play Experience if a character waits until they are 10th level to finally use their ability, especially if they do something really stupid like sacrifice themselves for the rest of the party going "I only have to pay 4 pp and use my daily Planeshift!"
Now the ability to never die if someone casts Dimensional Anchor on you? That's clearly abusive. You can argue that the eldest could simply force you to no longer exist, especially if you did this intentionally. But it's a hard sell given Imbrex would probably respect your tenacity and especially be willing if it meant defending your sibling, Ranalc doesn't interfere with his followers, The Lantern King doesn't care and Shyka is going to use you until you've done whatever crazy thing she knows your going to do anyway.
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I'm a little confused by what you are thinking. It is clearly intended to and still does immediately auto-resurrect you. The cost of this in PFS is 4 prestige. You can choose to not have the resurrection work.
As for Plane Swap, hey at least it lets you run away when stuff gets bad or maybe banish an unconscious enemy to the first world (bring a way home).
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The clarification shouldn't mention "Raise Dead/Breath of Life", then. Because, barring another character having a "readied" Breath of Life or an item like a Talisman of False Life, there is no circumstance wherein you wouldn't just lose the 4 Prestige due to your own class ability.
My point is: The Feysworn has an ability that casts an effect that teleports and resurrects it the instant it dies. Therefore, you lose 4 prestige whenever you die, because your own class ability is, to quote the clarification, an "effect that would bring the Feysworn back to life".
I don't even know how you'd cast Raise Dead when the whole body is Teleported to the first world. But you shouldn't have to once the Feysworn is level 5: The character can cast Planeshift on themselves and return to the Material Plane.
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Maybe what it means with context is:
Upon death, a feysworn is immediately resurrected and transported to a location on the First World sacred to the Eldest the feysworn worships. Any time a feysworn is targeted by an effect that would restore her to life (e.g. raise dead or breath of life or this ability), she must immediately expend 4 Prestige Points or the effect fails.
This lets you:
1. Use this ability for 4 prestige appearing alive but in the First World
2. Ignore this ability and be dead where you were. You can be raised as normal where you are but it still requires 4 prestige or it fails.
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It would take a very special ability to prevent the transportation effect (not called out as teleportation in the ability) because it is extraordinary.
Effects or areas that suppress or negate magic have no effect on extraordinary abilities.
So maybe something could stop this but it would need a clause that overrides this rule with a more specific rule.
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That doesn't seem right at all. The ability clearly says it resurrects you. Being alive is not a drawback. The drawback is:
From that point forward, the character is held in her living state only by the Eldest’s will. While the amount of service the Eldest demands in exchange varies, if at any point the Eldest becomes displeased enough to revoke this status, the feysworn is immediately and utterly destroyed, her soul energy permanently reabsorbed into the First World. Creatures slain in this manner cannot be resurrected short of deific intervention.
You are paying 4 prestige to not be held in living state by the will of the Eldest.
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Venture-Agent, Nebraska—Omaha
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Being alive and trapped on a different plane without hope of returning is much worse than being dead on the material plane.
The clarification explicitly says that you can use raise dead and breath of life. Clearly, the PFS team considers the instant revival/transport as part of the same drawback.
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The clarification explicitly says that you can use raise dead and breath of life.
Yeah because they said "she must immediately expend 4 Prestige Points or the effect fails". You can choose to not be resurrected by the ability.
Here is how this plays out:
1. You die.
2. The extraordinary ability says "you are immediately resurrected and transported to a location on the First World. This fails unless you pay 4 prestige."
3. You don't pay 4 prestige and are dead at your current location.
4. Your party member casts raise or breath of life targeting you.
5. The extraordinary ability says "This fails unless you pay 4 prestige."
6. You pay the 4 prestige and are raised where you died.
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I don't really see it as "trapped in another plane" given the class has a feature that lets it detect the closest rift back to the material plane and, at level 5, planeshift 1/day.
The only "trapped" part is if you don't complete some unknown "task" for the Eldest, they can choose to make you cease to exist. But, let's admit it, betraying the non-present Ranalc is itself a form of worship for the Fey God of Betrayal, and if you were already in the Society collecting artifacts you are probably already doing what Shyka wanted you to do anyway...
Actually, it makes a lot of sense that you can pay 4 prestige to get the Grand Lodge to do or get something for your Eldest. Especially with Shyka and her gallery.
Developer
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It's like spending PP on body recovery. You arrange it beforehand. It's a bit of a corner case in which a character does not have the 4 PP during the scenario, and does afterword, but the current wording is more generous in that case - allowing you to pay the cost at raise dead.
Body recovery is a great analogy. The intent here is to turn the drawback part from "free resurrection, but you now have a bunch of debt to the Eldest to resolve, which could seriously hamper your ability to be a Pathfinder." to "You can be brought back from the dead like a normal Pathfinder. Pay 4 Prestige to represent the effort you spend performing more minor duties for the Eldest to defer your more onerous service."
You still get the immunity to spells not capable of targeting fey from Feymarked.
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The clarification does not have to call out resurrection by name because it says an effect that would restore her to life and then provides 2 examples.
I don't think many other people will reach the conclusion that the ability that says it brings you to life again doesn't do so.
Edit:
The intent here is to turn the drawback part from "free resurrection, but you now have a bunch of debt to the Eldest to resolve, which could seriously hamper your ability to be a Pathfinder." to "You can be brought back from the dead like a normal Pathfinder. Pay 4 Prestige to represent the effort you spend performing more minor duties for the Eldest to defer your more onerous service."
Can you be more clear on the exact drawback? Is it "From that point forward, the character is held in her living state only by the Eldest’s will. While the amount of service the Eldest demands in exchange varies, if at any point the Eldest becomes displeased enough to revoke this status, the feysworn is immediately and utterly destroyed, her soul energy permanently reabsorbed into the First World. Creatures slain in this manner cannot be resurrected short of deific intervention"?
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In Pathfinder Society, the Feymarked ability does two things:
1) Drawback: If costs 4 PP extra to be brought back from the dead.
2) Benefit: You are immune to effects that target humanoids but could not target fey.
The eldest aren't going to kill your PC in Organized Play unless you as the player want them to.
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Venture-Lieutenant, Finland—Tampere
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In Pathfinder Society, the Feymarked ability does two things:
1) Drawback: If costs 4 PP extra to be brought back from the dead.
2) Benefit: You are immune to effects that target humanoids but could not target fey.The eldest aren't going to kill your PC in Organized Play unless you as the player want them to.
How does this work in conjunction with breath of life?
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So.. why does it cost 4 prestige more than a normal person to come back? The Eldest didn't even bring you back from the dead. You haven't received anything from the Eldest so why are they making it harder to come back to life?
The you are immune to effects that target humanoids but could not target fey is equal to a feat (e.g. Animal Soul).
You already lose spell progression in the class. You get a feat in return. Why is there an additional drawback when in PFS we don't get the raise?
I'm just a little baffled to be honest.
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You already lose spell progression in the class. You get a feat in return. Why is there an additional drawback when in PFS we don't get the raise?
Because it isn't an additional drawback. It's a replacement for what is a major drawback to the class originally. The Feymarked ability does not truly provide a "free" raise outside of PFS. It's basically becoming an absolute slave to the Eldest you are sworn to. Until the Eldest decides to release you you have to do exactly what they want. So the GM creates a quest for you or your party members to complete in order for you to be returned to your normal state. Or hand-waves it. Or says "you can't play that character for the next two books of the AP while she is doing her service to the Eldest. Roll a new character." Completely up to the GM.
In order to standardize it and rather than try to come up with a complicated series of conditions you have to meet in order to continue playing your character in PFS, the Campaign Clarifications team decided to simply require an additional 4 PP to represent bypassing the service to the Eldest.
It could just has easily have been "you are returned to life on the First World for free but must spend two years of real time in service to the Eldest. Have the GM mark the date of your character's death on this chronicle. You may not play this character again until two years have passed."
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Yeah but it also easily could have been "you are returned to life on the First World for free but must spend prestige." What you are saying would make sense if you, as you said, were representing the bypassing of the service but they didn't DO anything in PFS to even warrant the service.
It clearly is an additional drawback.
Before you got raised. You owed them.
Now you don't get raised. You still owe them? Makes no sense at all.
It would just make a lot more sense if the entire ability was:
"Feymarked (Ex): Feysworn creatures are immune to any spell not capable of targeting fey (such as dominate person, charm person, hold person, and any other spells specifically targeting humanoids). This immunity can be voluntarily suspended as per the rules for spell resistance.
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Yeah but it also easily could have been "you are returned to life on the First World for free but must spend prestige." What you are saying would make sense if you, as you said, were representing the bypassing of the service but they didn't DO anything in PFS to even warrant the service.
It clearly is an additional drawback.
Before you got raised. You owed them.
Now you don't get raised. You still owe them? Makes no sense at all.
You're thinking of the first paragraph of the "Feymarked" ability as a benefit (free raise dead). But it's not. It's a negative akin to the "Damned" ability of the Demonaic, Diabolist, or Souldrinker. When you die you instantly get sent to the relevant plane. The "Damned" abilities allow a quantifiable way to return the character to his regular life (caster level check) but "Feymarked" as written is entirely up to GM fiat. So PFS added the 4PP requirement as a consistent way to allow the character to continue in the campaign.
The negative consequence of Feymarked is something your character chooses to accept when he decides to become Feysworn. Entirely eliminating that consequence for PFS would remove what was deliberately written into the class by the designer.
It's entirely reasonable for a player to decide that the negatives outweigh the positives and therefore decide not to take levels in the class.
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Venture-Lieutenant, Netherlands—Leiden
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I think the point where people trip up is that the ability really can be interpreted two ways:
A) It's a benefit of your connection to the fey world where death means something different. But because you don't come from there originally you require help and you're only fey-alive at the the pleasure of the Eldest. (drawback to the benefit)
B) It's the drawback of selling your soul to the fey. (pure drawback)
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I think in the efforts of due diligence letting the party know at the scenario start that dying is pretty bad for you compared to other folks, and it costs extra even for things like Breath of Life should be highlighted so folks don't assume you're in it for a hypothetical 'free res'.
As far as Story? Well, the Deal that may have been Brokered (or enabled, whatnot) may be "Until such time as one has no means to return to the living in the Second World (Golarion, etc), one may do as one wilt. At such point no means are available, one will return here immediately and forever."
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It's entirely reasonable for a player to decide that the negatives outweigh the positives and therefore decide not to take levels in the class.
Obviously, very few in the PFS will. This prestige class is just too underpowered to be playable. I've outlined the reasons before, but in summary - most of the class's powers are for finding breaches and planar travel, something that is never needed in PFS.
If First World PFS scenarios are ever written (and there's no indication that there will), just like the current planar scenarios the means for travel will be provided by an NPC or story.
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This prestige class is just too underpowered to be playable.
Oh dear. . . you've hit on one of my passion topics. . . Challenge Accepted!
(It will be a while before I get to this one. I used my GM credit bundle as a Prophet of Kalistrade the last time someone disparaged prestige classes and all my real characters are either 1st level or already in a prestige class.)
Hmmm. . . I'm leaning towards either Magdh or Ng as a patron. I like the idea of a follower of Ng who is a stoic traveler. Not a "strong silent" type, but just one who only speaks when speaking conveys something of worth. Maybe use the World Walker druid archetype as the base class. An Anmnesiac psychic of The Lost Prince has definite possibilities as well.
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** spoiler omitted **
While I concur on the general sentiment, there is a need to feel like one is actively contributing in all phases of the game, especially in an organized campaign like PFS.
As a result, SPECIFICALLY the fighter, but several of the other 2 skill point classes also fail to measure up to this mark, essentially forcing players to play specific races or specific classes to remain viable on all phases.
That's not very fun for folks who have races they prefer that aren't viable, nor is it fun for any table that has to 'live' (or die) with sub-optimal class design.
The only 'good' option is potentially being removed from play, which will just amplify the issue.
I'm actually hoping for it to be done thoroughly and solidly the first time, so that when I buy it I don't feel 'ripped off', and I have a little bit of time before I can actually play any of the characters it would impact.
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I find "too underpowered" isn't really a thing in (most) PFS. Flavorful prestige classes like this will be weaker than just taking the base class, most of the time. But a Wizard 5/Feymarked 6 is plenty powerful enough to be a productive member of the team and get through the challenges presented in organized play. Heck, there just comes a point in system mastery where you can "nerf" yourself with "suboptimal builds" like this for purposes of flavor or the sheer challenge without negatively impacting the party. I mean, outside of like Bonekeep or Waking Rune.
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If you're playing a full caster and you're getting into the level range where a prestige class is a viable option, you don't lack for power! Sure, it hurts to give up that level of spellcasting progression, but it's not like that one level turns you into a fighter or anything. You just aren't the font of true and ultimate power that you could have been.
Your mileage may vary of course. I just find it fun to find flavorful things to do with full casters. They're so powerful to begin with that they rarely become unplayable no matter what you do with them.
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I agree with Belafon - "underpowered" is largely* a myth, often promulgated by those who only feel successful if they defeat everything in the first round with minimal expenditure.
I've been in games where if you don't win initiative, you don't act. Yep, many prestige classes can't play that game. Luckily, many players don't want to play that game, either.
they're not unplayable.
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I know it's been a while since this thread was going, but I'm considering building toward Feysworn and just want to make sure I get this right.
If I'm a Feysworn PC and I die (no one in the party has any type of raise for me), which of the following happens:
1) I treat it like normal and pay for body recovery (if applicable) and spellcasting service for a Raise/Rez and pay an extra 4PP due to being Feysworn
or
2) I'm immediately brought back to life on the first world, so I need to pay 4PP to represent working for the Eldest and making my way back.
Or
3) I'm in the First World, still need to pay for the Raise, pay 4 PP for being Feysworn, but don't have to pay for Body Recovery as I can get myself back under my own power.
Sorry it just really didn't make sense reading through this thread which of these options is the right one.
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I know it's been a while since this thread was going, but I'm considering building toward Feysworn and just want to make sure I get this right.
If I'm a Feysworn PC and I die (no one in the party has any type of raise for me), which of the following happens:
1) I treat it like normal and pay for body recovery (if applicable) and spellcasting service for a Raise/Rez and pay an extra 4PP due to being Feysworn
This one. We had a developer tell us what the total effects of the ability are:
In Pathfinder Society, the Feymarked ability does two things:
1) Drawback: If costs 4 PP extra to be brought back from the dead.
2) Benefit: You are immune to effects that target humanoids but could not target fey.