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EDIT
Thank you and your team very much for the continued communication, and for realizing the gentle balance of power creep and nerf that is in play with such a situation.
Thanks also for stepping up and grabbing the responsibility to make things right for your customers while still respecting the system balance required.
/EDIT
I brought it up in another thread, but I'll revisit it here, just so it doesn't get lost:
What is the interaction of Druid 'Wild Shape' and Shifter 'Wild Shape'?
If a character is a Shifter and subsequently takes levels of Druid the 'rest of the way', does it retain the limited capability of Shifter, or the fully functional capability of a Druid?
Does such a character then get the druidic number of uses and hours available in one hour increments?
Alternatively, if a character starts as a Druid and then adds Shifter, does their Wild Shape change to the more restricted version, or do they retain the freedom of various forms?
If Shifter and Druid Wild Shape are different, can such a character use a Minor Aspect while in a Druidic Wild Shape?
Can such a character cast spells while in a Shifter Wild Shape?
Perhaps the 'dead' levels can extend the functionality of the Shifter Wild Shape, or alternatively, multiply the number of hours a Shifter has for their forms?
I've found another slight issue with the shifter class that probably needs an FAQ. It seems obvious that the snake major aspect is supposed to get a bite attack, but there aren't any rules in it for such an attack.
I believe the baseline Beast Shape II functionality grants the Emperor Cobra's Bite attack...?
2 questions re: Shifter Claws in Wildshape:
If the form doesn't have claws, up to 2 of it's nat weapons "deal the same damage as her shifter claws". Does it mean only 'damage die' or does it now apply 'primary' nat weapon STR dmg also? Or if the latter, would it also just make the entire attack 'primary' for attack bonus a well?
Also, is there way for forms with only 1 natural attack (e.g. Snake/Bite) to get multiple attacks with it? OK, it's 1-1/2 STR dmg, but that only goes so far. Animal Companions get one pseudo-iterative if they only have one attack, but what is the deal here? Or is it "good luck with adding that single attack on as secondary to a UAS full attack?" (not even sure if that works for forms like Snake, since head butt is out if using bite, and you no longer have other limbs...)
Never really cared when using single attack forms as Druid because I could use other forms whenever that wasn't particularly advantageous, but with Shifter being so form-limited, it seems relevant to ask about. Is there some Feat for this or what? Dip in Monk to get that Nat Attack Flurry working and then just continue with Shifter BAB?
If we're talking about dead levels, maybe we could add that the shfiter can combine major forms. Hey if it can combine minor forms, I don't see why it could combine major forms ;)
These days, I feel like it's a good thing to address issues and offer an errata, especially with digital releases. I'm just glad that Paizo addressed the issue with the class.
Very glad to see this from the team....I look foreword to seeing the fixes (especially on the oozemorph) going foreword.
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It would be nice if the major aspects let you change into any animal related to it. So instead of tiger aspect it would be cat aspect and you could change into any type of cat not just a dire tiger. Also the lack of aquatic animals doesn't make sense especially shark and octopus.
I would love an increase in claw damage, an increase in number of natural attacks, or at least the ability to choose what your two natural attacks will be.
Any of thees abilities I would love to see.
Minor morphing- Ability to alter facial characteristics, skin color, hair color, and eye color to gain a bonus on disguise or stealth.
Morphic defense- Ability to choose from a list of defensive abilities to have one(or more based on level) active at any time. You can change what this defense is at any time and whatever you choose stays active until changed. Examples would immunities(choices based on level), evasion, uncanny dodge, energy resistance, etc.
Shifter adaptation- Ability to adapt to an environment or situation. Similar to morphic defense on function and duration. Examples would be breathing water, swim speed, scent, low-light vision, wings, etc.
At will wild shape at level 20.
Other class abilities like favored terrain, resist nature's lure, venom immunity, a thousand faces, swift tracker, camouflage, and/or timeless body would be nice.
Great! This is a tidy way to bump up some of the functionality of the class without requiring a massive overhaul.
That said, I still feel it falls short of being the shifting superstar that it seems it should be. Improving high level wild shape, changing action economy for shaping as you level, adding easier access to utility forms, and other changes to make the class the clear cut winner at being an "awesome shapeshifter" would be great. Sadly, I don't think we'll see that kind of revision to a printed product.
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I thought about editing my previous post for visbility, but I'd rather not play that game.
I do like this idea of "Morphic Defense". Give to the shifter every 6 levels, so 6/12/18 (Thus fixing the two dead levels), it would give Shifter a moderate boost in strength without just pushing the damage numbers up, and would contribute well to the theme. Perhaps at 18th level as part of Morphic Immunities: Immunity to Critical Hits? Because they're just that good at morphing their body they can move critical organs. At level 6 perhaps give them some kind of self-only healing? At level 12 fast healing? I don't know, I'm just spitballing. Or instead of healing give them energy or condition defenses.
I also still think that 20th level should be at-will wildshape, because RAW, every time you change wildshape forms it uses up an hour whether or not you use the full hour, which means you can't alternate forms mid-combat without burning through uses. A 20th level Shifter could easily stay in a form for a full 24 hours, but it would have to be the -same- form.
That's a minor gripe considering how few people hit 20, but still.
Also adding some vermin to the list of shifter aspects would be cool especially spider, scorpion, slug, bee/wasp, mantis, jellyfish, beetle, and ant. Not from of a archetype, but to the base class.
Though personally I would prefer to get rid of major aspects and just let shifters change into any animal(or vermin). Now if the major aspects were additional powers that could be added to any form that would be cool. For example...
Wolf
minor-(at will)-add scent and low-light version.
major-(1 minute/level) add bite(1d6 base) plus trip plus +10 land speed.
Owl
minor-(at will)-low-light vision and +2 to +6 perception at night/darkness/low-light conditions.
Major-(1 minute/level)- gain 2 talons(1d4 base) and wings to fly60(good).
Bull
minor-(at will)- +2 to +6 enhancement bonus to strength.
Major-(1 minute/level)- Gore(1d6 base) plus trample and powerful charge.
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I've found another slight issue with the shifter class that probably needs an FAQ. It seems obvious that the snake major aspect is supposed to get a bite attack, but there aren't any rules in it for such an attack.
It's actually the other way around - it isn't the forms that lack listed attacks that are the problem, but rather the ones that do.
The problem stems from the general polymorph rules: "Each polymorph spell allows you to assume the form of a creature of a specific type, granting you a number of bonuses to your ability scores and a bonus to your natural armor. In addition, each polymorph spell can grant you a number of other benefits, including movement types, resistances, and senses. (...)
In addition to these benefits, you gain any of the natural attacks of the base creature, including proficiency in those attacks." Emphasis mine.
Shifter's Wild Shape says it "functions as beast shape II", so it's a polymorph effect, and none of the exceptions override the above rules (they only override the second sentence in the above quote).
Now, it's not exactly a new issue (every polymorph spell that lists gained natural attacks, including the CRB's Form of the Dragon, has the same problem), but the inconsistency of the Shifter's Aspects highlights it.
Given the fact that the "beast shape" of Wild shape is limited to the picked aspects, players might benefit from having the exact gains/losses/etc of each form listed out under the aspect, to prevent confusion and promote clarity.
Director of Game Design
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Hey there folks,
Thanks for all the continuing feedback on this issue. We know that the shifter still has some problems, some of which are created by this errata. We are looking at the issues and investigating the best way to fix them. I suspect you will see some movement on that front soon.
As for the ramifications of these changes to our products: Changes of this nature will be reflected in any reprints of the book. At that point, the PDF will be updated as well.
Thanks for understanding everybody. We deeply appreciate your dedication to the game and we will continue to work to make it better.
We're here to work with you to *hopefully* make it better.
A fresh set of eyes or a different perspective can sometimes help see the mental 'blind spots' one develops.
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Hey there all,
I just wanted to take a moment to thank you for going up-periscope and posting this here, regardless of the content itself.
I absolutely, positively get it that forums are very often caustic and abusive. I absolutely, positively get it that what you read here can be depressing, motivation-sapping, morale-destroying and emotionally painful. Really, truly, I do.
That said, I can offer that I very, very much enjoy the sense of connectedness and understanding that comes from the things that designers, developers, and even the warehouse crew share with us. Over the years there has been less and less contact with the design department for completely understandable reasons, but I wanted to let you know that even the slightest contact is appreciated.
I don't need to agree with any/every decision any Paizo employee posts, but I appreciate them nonetheless.
So thank you. To you, and to all those who still bring themselves to participate on the forums, despite the emotional cost. Hopefully a little more civility and appreciation from our end might result in us all having more fun together.
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I must agree; thanks so much for being willing to listen to customer feedback and and working with us to improve the experience overall. It's something that seems to be getting rarer and rarer as time goes on.
Dot to follow
Thanks Jason! Much appreciated to see you popping in. Hopefully some of what people have provided can be used for inspirations for edits/fixes, but nonetheless it's great to see that you're paying attention, and keeping an open mind. :)
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Given the fact that the "beast shape" of Wild shape is limited to the picked aspects, players might benefit from having the exact gains/losses/etc of each form listed out under the aspect, to prevent confusion and promote clarity.
This. I mentioned it before in another thread, but it would massively simplify the aspect ability if the exact stats were listed for the animal forms instead of saying "Like Beast Shape, but with these changes" which requires looking through three different sources for your final abilities. You could just have the basic ability score modifiers listed for the various sizes at the beginning of the section, then each individual aspect has a size listed and then whatever else.
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Or just give them the druid's wildshape options and have aspects be something you can tack on a form. This way "chimeric" aspect will truely be chimeric.
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First off, thank you for keeping the community up to date.
Second, what are the chances of a public playtest? I understand they are probably pretty low, but since Paizo doesn't make changes until all the previous printing of a book has sold... This might be a viable idea.
Will the PDF be getting updated before the 2nd printing hits the streets?
Will you be making an errata document and making it available before the 2nd printing hits the streets?
Thanks again. I have a little more faith in the company now. ^_^
Well done reacting to community input, Jason! Explaining your design process if helpful for all us third party types out here on the boards.
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Something I'm a little curious about, the OP says that the shifter reaches your expected damage output. Is that only with 1 or 2 forms or are all the forms reaching expected damage output benchmarks?
I ask because most builds I've seen for it have it's DPR quite low, really only the pouncing once seem to at all reach the levels of other full-bab classes. All other full bab have a base effectiveness that seems quite a bit higher than the effectiveness of non-pouncing shifters.
Also what do you mean with full might of the druid? I feel like most people were pointing out just using obvious druid buffs like strongjaw, magic fang greater, barkskin and the likes, same thing for the shifting hunter. There doesn't seem like any TOP TIER OMG LOOK AT THAT RULES MASTERY builds needed to surpass the shifter, just the same stat array and using the obvious basic buff spells seems to outfight a shifter.
Thank you for the posts and the updates. I look forward to what is to come.
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Also what do you mean with full might of the druid? I feel like most people were pointing out just using obvious druid buffs like strongjaw, magic fang greater, barkskin and the likes, same thing for the shifting hunter. There doesn't seem like any TOP TIER OMG LOOK AT THAT RULES MASTERY builds needed to surpass the shifter, just the same stat array and using the obvious basic buff spells seems to outfight a shifter.
To be honest the druid really starts outpacing the shifter once they have access to Beast Shape III at 8th level for wildshape. The amount of options available for in and out of combat is quite diverse. There's a array of creatures you can build around for combat and there's plenty of diminutive and huge creatures that can be used for a wide variety of reasons.
No mounts? Turn in to something big enough to carry the whole party. If you have 20 Str and you turn into a elephant you can carry 1836 lbs easy as a light load and 5520 lbs as a heavy load. Can easily drag 27600 lbs so just buy a cart and hook you up whenever you start going on a journey. Wanna spy? Well how you wanna do it. There's an entire suite of options. Endless possibilities.
Something like that, no spellcasting, cause it's easier to remember creatures then the myriad spells that are out there is probably what people are wanting.
I don't know if you guys have already considered this, and as someone else mentioned not many make it to level 20, but have you guys considered adding a capstone skill for the shifter archetypes to replace Final Aspect? As is the only one of them that is sort of able to use Final Aspect is the Elemental Shifter. All the others replace aspects with something else, and cannot benefit from Final Aspect.
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Thanks for going back to the design board, it is good to see!
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Just throwing this out there. If you re-arrange the Shifter class table like the monk's with the recent changes kept in mind we get something that looks like this: Shifter Table.
There's something like 8 to 10 dead levels depending on how you look at it. If you were to include druid wild shape options then that drops to about 6 dead levels. That's enough to throw in bonus feats and some 1 to 2 line abilities like maybe the ability to wild shape faster or some immunities. If you're feeling adventurous expand the wild shape options at higher levels.
I'm really happy to see that you followed through on your promise to take another look at the Shifter. It's still not quite where I'd like to see it but the Wildshape changes are definitely a huge quality of life improvement for the class. :)
I realize it's late for a playtest but if you're looking for some feedback, like I mentioned previously I'd really love to see an option that lets you speed up shifting in combat. That way you can really leverage the strengths of the different shapes. Things like changing to a stag to charge a creature too far away for your bear form to reach or swift-changing to an owl to fly over difficult terrain and then turn into a tiger in mid-air to pounce on your opponent seems very in character for a shifter. As it stands right now shifters feel fairly "static" in combat - they tend to pick a combat form and stick to it. Other shapes are mostly used for utility, scouting etc.
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I'm really happy to see that you followed through on your promise to take another look at the Shifter. It's still not quite where I'd like to see it but the Wildshape changes are definitely a huge quality of life improvement for the class. :)
I realize it's late for a playtest but if you're looking for some feedback, like I mentioned previously I'd really love to see an option that lets you speed up shifting in combat. That way you can really leverage the strengths of the different shapes. Things like changing to a stag to charge a creature too far away for your bear form to reach or swift-changing to an owl to fly over difficult terrain and then turn into a tiger in mid-air to pounce on your opponent seems very in character for a shifter. As it stands right now shifters feel fairly "static" in combat - they tend to pick a combat form and stick to it. Other shapes are mostly used for utility, scouting etc.
There's Shifter's Rush for that, which is immensely helpful with the changes to Wild Shape now.
There's Shifter's Rush for that, which is immensely helpful with the changes to Wild Shape now.
That is a fantastic feat now, thank you for pointing it out for me. :)
Thanks everyone at Paizo for taking another look at the Shifter class.
Minor issue with weapon prof., would love to add a few more weapons especially great club but any of the following would also be nice; aklys, blowgun, bolas, boomarang, chakram, hand axe, klar, lasso, long spear, net, short bow, throwing axe, and/or whip.
My curiosity here is if the revamp of the Shifter also includes some consideration of things that the Shifter doesn't qualify for, but clearly should have some claim to, such as Wild Speech.
My curiosity here is if the revamp of the Shifter also includes some consideration of things that the Shifter doesn't qualify for, but clearly should have some claim to, such as Wild Speech.Why would they not qualify for Wild Speech? they have Wild Shape class feature, and under that feature for things that use Wild Shape they are counted as a druid. Thus a 6th lvl Shifter should qualify for the feat.
You can take it but the druid level only counts for prerequisites. As such, the speak with animals SLA has a caster level of 0 [your druid levels] and lasts 0 min [your druid level].
"for the purpose of qualifying for prerequisites, her effective druid level is equal to her shifter level."
Just throwing this out there. If you re-arrange the Shifter class table like the monk's with the recent changes kept in mind we get something that looks like this: Shifter Table.
There's something like 8 to 10 dead levels depending on how you look at it. If you were to include druid wild shape options then that drops to about 6 dead levels. That's enough to throw in bonus feats and some 1 to 2 line abilities like maybe the ability to wild shape faster or some immunities. If you're feeling adventurous expand the wild shape options at higher levels.
That chart is really handy to reference, definitely saving a copy of that.
While the added flexibility is great, it seems weird that after a short period other wild shaping classes will be able to stay shifted for longer portions of the day. It probably won't come into play very often, as I can only recall a couple instances in campaigns I've been in where the duration issue would have mattered, but it seems odd none-the-less.
Will anything be done to fix how the class interacts with some of the Wild Shape feats? They allow you to pick them, yet do nothing since the Shifter doesn't count as a Druid for determining how the feat functions (level stacking, etc.).
The big concern is still the narrow number of forms that they are limited too. I've got a DM looking to run Ruins of Azlant in the near future and the lack of any solid aquatic species is a huge letdown. Tossing around ideas with fellow players brought up a list of common/popular animals that were passed up: Apes, Dragons, and Elephants were popular, not to mention Sharks and Crocodiles. Dragons in particular seems like a missed opportunity for an exciting archetype right out the gate.
The idea we tossed around is changing the aspects from form specific, to a broader category with several options in each. Frog could change to water/aquatic, Tiger to predator (add in a few more cats), Bull to might (add in some more burly animals), falcon to wind/soaring (get some more bird forms of various sizes), etc, etc. Yes, it would take more reading, but it'd still be more streamlined than selecting spells.
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Ok, so, I have a fair number of issues with shifter.
Like...
Why can Druid (or feral hunter) get the full blown emperor cobra poison on every single attack before shifter gets it on only AOO's
A simple comparison to normal wild shape reveals that in terms of abilities, shifter is constantly behind it's peers, while supposedly specializing in shapechanging.
Feral Hunter is an obvious example, getting abilities faster, with full acess to all it's "minor forms" as constants, and 6th level spellcasting, only falling slightly behind in terms of bab- and considering you use full bab for all natural attacks, this means that Hunter will almost always outclass shifter at the very thing shifter is meant to do, even if you ignore hunter's spellcasting outright
This new change is also a large downgrade for certain archtypes like weretouched, who were already hurting for viability.
It's great that you're working to fix the class, but I have to say I think more needs to be done.
My curiosity here is if the revamp of the Shifter also includes some consideration of things that the Shifter doesn't qualify for, but clearly should have some claim to, such as Wild Speech.Why would they not qualify for Wild Speech? they have Wild Shape class feature, and under that feature for things that use Wild Shape they are counted as a druid. Thus a 6th lvl Shifter should qualify for the feat.You can take it but the druid level only counts for prerequisites. As such, the speak with animals SLA has a caster level of 0 [your druid levels] and lasts 0 min [your druid level].
"for the purpose of qualifying for prerequisites, her effective druid level is equal to her shifter level."
Ok so the first half of the feat, doesn't rely on a caster level; thus they can still speak while in wild shape.
The second half; the Speak with Animals is kind of redundant anyways due to part of Wild Shape "A shifter ... can communicate with other animals of the same general grouping as her form." Which Wild Speech only lets her use it on animals of the same type and does pretty much the same thing; since ask questions (but doesn't force them to answer it) is pretty much just communication.
I'm just pointing out the only issue I could see with the feat: I make no claim on how relevant the issue is. Invoke Primal Instinct seems to be a better exemple IMO.
Well, they admitted what I had suspected: Starfinder was an issue. It occupied too much attention and this product suffered as a result. I would prefer that never happen again. Thank you for the frankness of your answer, Mr. Bulmahn.
I like the changes and the only other thing I would change is to give the Shifter TWO aspects upon creation at 1st level. To be stuck with one until 5th level was the only real issue I had with the class.