Sorshen stats question > Rise of New Thassilon


Return of the Runelords


Tremendous stat block for the redeemed Runelord of Lust [now Love?]. She has ten mythic tiers but I only see EIGHT path abilities in her stat block. Where are the missing two?

I see:

1. mythic presence
2. enduring armor [which she gets from path dabbling ... these two entires count as only one mythic path ability. The path dabbling ALLOWS her to take enduring armor from archmage path. Path dabbling does NOT require you to waste two path abilities to get one]
3. menacing whisper
4. mythic spellcasting
5. perfect mimic
6. subtle magic
7. thwart detection
8. vanishing move

From the top of her stat block:

aura of despair is a basic enchanter ability
contingency is from spell use
hard to kill, mythic saving throws, and unstoppable are base mythic abilities
amazing initiative is a base mythic ability
arcane bond is a base wizard ability
enchanting smile is a basic enchanter ability
Everdawn infusion and exceptional statistics are simply saucy extra abilities
fleet charge is Sorshen's base Trickster attack
inherent bonuses are from the use of wish spells
legendary hero is a base mythic ability
permanent spells are from the use of spell permanency
recuperation is a base mythic ability
supreme trickster is a base path ability for making tier 10

What am I missing? What are her final two mythic path abilities?

Thanks all!


Enhanced Ability (Cha) and Enhanced Ability (Int)
OR
Enhanced Ability (Dex) and Enhanced Ability (Cha)
OR
Enhanced Ability (Dex) and Enhanced Ability (Int)

Only way to get her listed ability scores (Ignoring enhancement bonuses to physical ability scores):

Sorshen Ability Scores:

Str 14 (7+2a+5i)
Dex 24 (15+2a+5i+2(lvl/mythic))
Con 22 (15+2a+5i)
Int 40 (16+2a+5i+3v+6e+8(lvl/mythic))
Wis 24 (8+2a+5i+3v+6e)
Cha 40 (15+2a+5i+3v+6e+9(lvl/mythic))
a=azlanti racials
i=inherent
e=enhancement
v=venerable age


Pathfinder Adventure Path, Rulebook, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber

Ah, that would then make sense of her stats, if the two abilities simply aren't listed.


Possible answer but her stat block also mentions that the gear presented is a minimum and that she has an additional trove if you will.

Remember that "Enhanced Ability" is far from the only solution. She could have pulled one or more theater cards from a Harrow Deck of Many Things ... that's a +2 untyped bonus. Additionally, there are several examples in prior adventure paths where an individual receives untyped +1 or +2 bonuses to an ability score of their choice. Reign of Winter and Wrath of the Righteous are two concrete examples. No reason Sorshen couldn't have scored similar treats.

Was hoping James Jacobs or Greg A. Vaughan could shed some light ...??

"Enhanced Ability" = boring choice for someone like Sorshen. That said, it was a cool and intriguing choice to have her in the Trickster path. Bold play Mr. Vaughan ;)


Derron42 wrote:

Possible answer but her stat block also mentions that the gear presented is a minimum and that she has an additional trove if you will.

Remember that "Enhanced Ability" is far from the only solution. She could have pulled one or more theater cards from a Harrow Deck of Many Things ... that's a +2 untyped bonus. Additionally, there are several examples in prior adventure paths where an individual receives untyped +1 or +2 bonuses to an ability score of their choice. Reign of Winter and Wrath of the Righteous are two concrete examples. No reason Sorshen couldn't have scored similar treats.

Was hoping James Jacobs or Greg A. Vaughan could shed some light ...??

"Enhanced Ability" = boring choice for someone like Sorshen. That said, it was a cool and intriguing choice to have her in the Trickster path. Bold play Mr. Vaughan ;)

If Sorshen had those then I would expect the statblock to have mentioned other "interesting" bonuses like it does the inherent and age-based bonuses.

Much less, James Jacobs had previously mentioned the Enhanced Ability path ability in his Ask James Jacobs Anything thread when asked what he would hypothetically give Sorshen as path abilities. In lieu of any comment(s) from him, this is the most likely reason for Sorshen to have 8 listed path abilities. I see nothing wrong with her taking those abilities as they are choices that make sense even if they are, in your words, "boring choice".


You can't rely on the audience and customers reading a thread to get across information for an actual product. That would sorta be like a journalist saying "I didn't put that in my NY Times article because I'd mentioned it in my podcast". This is not a slam at you Dryad Knotwood or James ... simply not an acceptable journalistic tactic. And fair point ... you did note "hypothetically".

And if the stat block missed the two path abilities then they could absolutely miss Harrow Deck cards and "quest bonuses".

Thanks for taking the time to answer folks ;)

Paizo Employee Creative Director

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I do appreciate that some folks enjoy reverse engineering stat blocks, but I don't really have the time to get into deep discussions of NPC design theory—sorry. That said, we didn't list her Enhanced Ability scores—her stat block was a monster to fit onto two pages while retaining even a few lines of descriptive flavor text, and that means that we often need to excise things that serve only to "show our math" but have no impact on the statblock as it is used in play if they go missing.

Her stats are about where they need to be for a creature of her CR, in any event, so HOW they got there is in large part irrelevant.


1 person marked this as a favorite.
Derron42 wrote:

You can't rely on the audience and customers reading a thread to get across information for an actual product. That would sorta be like a journalist saying "I didn't put that in my NY Times article because I'd mentioned it in my podcast". This is not a slam at you Dryad Knotwood or James ... simply not an acceptable journalistic tactic. And fair point ... you did note "hypothetically".

And if the stat block missed the two path abilities then they could absolutely miss Harrow Deck cards and "quest bonuses".

Thanks for taking the time to answer folks ;)

Thank you for that clarification on your point. I just like simple solutions when looking at statblocks, especially high-level ones where they generally include mention of extra bonuses.

Honestly, I'm thinking Enhanced Ability is being treated in the same way as level-based ability score increases, so they don't have to show them other than in the final ability scores.


James Jacobs wrote:

I do appreciate that some folks enjoy reverse engineering stat blocks, but I don't really have the time to get into deep discussions of NPC design theory—sorry. That said, we didn't list her Enhanced Ability scores—her stat block was a monster to fit onto two pages while retaining even a few lines of descriptive flavor text, and that means that we often need to excise things that serve only to "show our math" but have no impact on the statblock as it is used in play if they go missing.

Her stats are about where they need to be for a creature of her CR, in any event, so HOW they got there is in large part irrelevant.

Gotcha. Thanks for clarifying James. I appreciate you taking the time. Enjoy the rest of your week.

Dark Archive

Pathfinder Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber

Just to note though that at end of the AP she officially isn't Runelord anymore at least as far as her weapon cares :p


Pathfinder Adventure Path, Rulebook, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
CorvusMask wrote:
Just to note though that at end of the AP she officially isn't Runelord anymore at least as far as her weapon cares :p

Well, that's still under discussion, if you read the weapon entry.

Dark Archive

Pathfinder Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
magnuskn wrote:
CorvusMask wrote:
Just to note though that at end of the AP she officially isn't Runelord anymore at least as far as her weapon cares :p
Well, that's still under discussion, if you read the weapon entry.

Well not really since if you read destruction quality, as far as universal forces are concerned she isn't Runelord anymore and thus weapon is able to be destroyed.

Even if weapon turns new leaf and turns CN, Sorshen wouldn't still count as Runelord for purpose of making the weapon invulnerable

I think reason is that Alara'quin are for specifically 7 governors of Old Thassilon, so when she declares herself a queen of new thassilon, she stops being "Runelord of Lust of Nation Thassilon"


Pathfinder Adventure Path, Rulebook, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber

Touché, that's a good argument. She probably wouldn't want to call herself a Runelord, to be honest. Bad associations and all that.

Dark Archive

Pathfinder Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber

Though on sidenote, that actually high lights how you became a runelord officially:

You need to be 1) matching wizard type to the sin 2) have the weapon of rule 3) claim rule of an area under the rule of corresponding Thassilonian nation.

Soo basically, if you wanted to be a runelord of greed, you would basically need to make Xin-Shalast's residents bow down to you as the runelord of greed and then you could proceed to conquer rest of the world without problems :p

Presumable you wouldn't need to conquer a historical area of the nation, you just need to claim any area as domain of the nation. So if you killed Alaznist as evoker wizard, conquered Korvosa and declared it part of Bakrakhan, I think that would count.


With all those high-level spells with stratospheric DCs, I frankly don't think she needs a weapon.


As a compulsive power gamer I just spent a while rebuilding Sorshen. I can get everything except her strength to match , her strength has to be at least 20
minimum 7 at character design
+2 Azlanti human
+5 inherent bonus wish
+6 magical belt

It looks like the stat block has a belt of Physical improvement +6 Dex and Con included rather than +6 to all stats.

I really do appreciate her build it is a nice build making fun use of mythic powers. It is of course crippled compared to an optimised mythic archmage but that makes it usable in play while a mythic 10 archmage would probably be too powerful.

Edit
And I just read the discussion about her strength in the main AP thread so please ignore this , only about a fortnight late to notice it


Even with Alaznist I found her strength score of 20 to be suspect. Was that the intended score?


It's not wrong if that's the question:

Alaznist Ability Score Breakdown
Str: 20 = 8 + 2 azlanti + 4 inherent + 6 enhancement
Dex: 26 = 14 + 2 azlanti + 4 inherent + 6 enhancement
Con: 36 = 14 + 2 azlanti + 4 inherent + 6 enhancement + 4 profane + 6 lvl/mythic
Int: 36 = 17 + 2 azlanti + 5 inherent + 6 enhancement + 3 age + 3 lvl/mythic
Wis: 24 = 9 + 2 azlanti + 4 inherent + 6 enhancement + 3 age
Cha: 32 = 14 + 2 azlanti + 5 inherent + 6 enhancement + 3 age + 2 lvl/mythic

It's possible to obtain all of the listed ability scores with a 25 PB as above which assumes the Enhanced Ability mythic path ability was taken once for either Intelligence, Constitution or Charisma. 20 Str is not weird at all.

Paizo Employee Creative Director

Patrickthekid wrote:
Even with Alaznist I found her strength score of 20 to be suspect. Was that the intended score?

The intended scores are the ones as written.

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