What time to prepare is requiredSeveral of the examples discussed in this thread talk about preparing dozens of snares in advance of a fight.
Or really at all since the GM has to step in and fix the broken-ness of the rule in question.Mostly what you've talked about is GM enabled brokenness, not the other way around. If the GM chooses to allow you to plant four snares at once in the same square from 500 feet away, that's their business. Pretending that's normal or expected behavior though is highly disingenuous.
My primary example was Jim the Ranger using one turn of actions to plant his 4 snares in one square mid combat. The out of combat stuff is even worse in scale with any downtime.
Addressing the GM enabled stuff... What? The rules are pretty clear in how this is supposed to work. Nowhere in the rulebook is there a restriction saying you can only craft one snare per turn. In fact the crafting rules state that any item with Consumable can be made in batches of 4. Snares are consumables so there is no inbuilt reason for them to not be crafted in 4's.
There is no rule saying that no two snares can be made in the same 5 foot square. Just that a snare must be in a 5 foot square. But what if I make multiple snares over multiple turns? Why can't 2 caltrop snares be in the same square?
Too much is enabled by the Core Rules that then have to be changed by the GM to work in a way the rules simply do not.
Sure, you could argue that that is the job of the GM. But I argue that Paizo has the responsibility to address rules that are outright unacceptably vague and broken in their current state.
I do not appreciate your attempt to derail the discussion. I am not in favor of this use of Snares. The whole point of this post is to point out how badly this little subsystem works. It is not clear as written how they intend Snares to work. This puts any GM's ruling in question no matter how common sense they seem.
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What time to prepare is required? All of this is doable in mid combat. Also, sure it is craaaazy to allow Jim the Ranger to do these things.
I don't see a snare that is worth 3 actions mid combat. You can do about the same damage just shooting the enemy and not wasting a limited resource.
With Lightning snare, sure. Even if the enemy sees you put it down, if you have a fighter with knockback, shove, Hydraulic Push, or whatever. It's an easy enough to move+shoot+drop snare, and whomever can trigger.
What time to prepare is required? All of this is doable in mid combat. Also, sure it is craaaazy to allow Jim the Ranger to do these things.I don't see a snare that is worth 3 actions mid combat. You can do about the same damage just shooting the enemy and not wasting a limited resource.
With Lightning snare, sure. Even if the enemy sees you put it down, if you have a fighter with knockback, shove, Hydraulic Push, or whatever. It's an easy enough to move+shoot+drop snare, and whomever can trigger.
5d6 for one biting snare out of the 4 you can make for free doesn't seem worth it against what, 2 semi-accurate 1d8+1 or so attacks with a bow? I think that's a steal for 2 feats, one of which is a skill feat.
Edit: And that is without the broken ruling on crafting them as a batch. If you account for that, then 20d6 is Definitely worth those 2 accurate bow shots your giving up for that turn.
Lightning snares I don't even consider worthwhile unless they fix the batch non-sense. Again, not something your GM should even Have to fix with a houserule.
I do not appreciate your attempt to derail the discussion.That's nice.
I am not in favor of this use of Snares.You generally seem to have a strong distaste for snares in general. You've spent most of the thread ragging on everything about them, so yeah that's pretty obvious.
But ultimately for a majority of the issues that you bring up, your justification is "the rules don't say I can't!", which is not a rules argument. It's assumptions and vague extrapolations at best, not hard rules. That's all well and good, but trying to masquerade that as RAW is ludicrous.
If you comb through the rest of the book, and any other RPG book. You'll find lots and lots of things that the game doesn't say you can't do, because that's generally not how RPGs are written.
Okay. Using only the rules in the book with 0 house rules, I want you to give me the exact order of operations that a Ranger at 4th level with Snare Specialist uses to use his prepared snares. Only from the book rules. No conjecture, no DMing rulings.
I think you'll find it's pretty clear what is allowed in the rules and why that should change.
Edit: The problem isn't what the rules, "don't say I can't!" do, it's what they very clearly say I can do.
5d6 for one biting snare out of the 4 you can make for free doesn't seem worth it against what, 2 semi-accurate 1d8+1 or so attacks with a bow? I think that's a steal for 2 feats, one of which is a skill feat.Two feats and a skill increase to maybe do about 18 damage on average, assuming an enemy walks through the square you just spent a whole round crafting a trap in.
Or three attacks with a shortbow for about 9 damage each for one feat.
That third attack might be hard to land but even if just the first two hit you've equaled the snare's damage with less feat investment and without having to pray the enemy behaves idiotically.
Yep, very overpowered.
See, no, it's not overpowered. That is 1 snare placed. The rules clearly allow for Snares, which are consumables, to be crafted in 4's though don't they?
So how does that 2 accurate short bow attacks stack up to the 70 or so damage from 20d6?
See the problem now?
Edited for Clarity.
See, no, it's not overpowered.No, in fact it's pretty bad. You're spending feats and skill increases to somehow do less damage than if you had just attacked normally.
Okay. Using only the rules in the book with 0 house rules, I want you to give me the exact order of operations that a Ranger at 4th level with Snare Specialist uses to use his prepared snares. Only from the book rules. No conjecture, no DMing rulings.
Argue however you like about the effectiveness of Snares as a thing. The fact is that the rules are incomplete and do not work in a satisfactory way as written. And they absolutely should.
Addressing the GM enabled stuff... What? The rules are pretty clear in how this is supposed to work. Nowhere in the rulebook is there a restriction saying you can only craft one snare per turn. In fact the crafting rules state that any item with Consumable can be made in batches of 4. Snares are consumables so there is no inbuilt reason for them to not be crafted in 4's.
The reason is that basic craft is 4+ days.
And special snare crafting is 1 minute for "a" snare.Lighting snare also says "a" snare.
Nowhere in the rulebook is there a restriction saying you can only craft one snare per turn.
I see no issue with lighting snare placing 3 snares a turn.
Well, I would shoot once, and place 2. But still, no rule issue.
Sure, you could argue that that is the job of the GM. But I argue that Paizo has the responsibility to address rules that are outright unacceptably vague and broken in their current state.
Nothing in the rules says you have to exist in one place at one time. Or can't divide themselves into 3 clones. Or walk though walls. Or can't choose to ignore gravity. I think the GM saying crafting takes place adjacent to you is well within his job.
I do agree a "can't put multiple snares in the same 5' space" would be an errata.
Though, I'm kind of tempted to allow multiple. Alarm snare + Signaling Snare seems perfectly reasonable to put together. Maybe as an exception for those snares? Maybe give +2 to saves for each extra snare you have in the same spot?
Addressing the GM enabled stuff... What? The rules are pretty clear in how this is supposed to work. Nowhere in the rulebook is there a restriction saying you can only craft one snare per turn. In fact the crafting rules state that any item with Consumable can be made in batches of 4. Snares are consumables so there is no inbuilt reason for them to not be crafted in 4's.The reason is that basic craft is 4+ days.
And special snare crafting is 1 minute for "a" snare.
Lighting snare also says "a" snare.Nowhere in the rulebook is there a restriction saying you can only craft one snare per turn.I see no issue with lighting snare placing 3 snares a turn.
Well, I would shoot once, and place 2. But still, no rule issue.
Sure, you could argue that that is the job of the GM. But I argue that Paizo has the responsibility to address rules that are outright unacceptably vague and broken in their current state.Nothing in the rules says you have to exist in one place at one time. Or can't divide themselves into 3 clones. Or walk though walls. Or can't choose to ignore gravity. I think the GM saying crafting takes place adjacent to you is well within his job.
I do agree a "can't put multiple snares in the same 5' space" would be an errata.
Though, I'm kind of tempted to allow multiple. Alarm snare + Signaling Snare seems perfectly reasonable to put together. Maybe as an exception for those snares? Maybe give +2 to saves for each extra snare you have in the same spot?
Read Snare Specialist again. You can place a snare that takes 1 minute to craft normally in 3 actions... if it's one of your "free ones". Quick Snares at lvl 6 allows you to do so with Any snare. Lightning Snares allows you to do so in 1 action.
The problem stems from using a Downtime Activity to craft snares in combat. The downtime activity Craft doesn't take into account anything about location. That isn't important when you are spending 4 days doing something. 6 seconds though make placement and positioning everything. The rules are Incomplete as I've said multiple times.
Sure at 12th level it makes sense that you could place 3 snares a turn. But at 4th? Not so much. Errata is needed.
Edit: I tend to agree with your opinion of Alarm and Signal snares being able to be together. In fact the Trip snare even states that you need multiple snares in a line to trip larger creatures. But the rules are ambiguous as to how you are supposed to pull this off. There should be some guidance on where you can place snares in combat. If a spell had a Range that was blank, wouldn't you think there should be an errata for that? Why not for Snares?
Read Snare Specialist again. You can place a snare that takes 1 minute to craft normally in 3 actions... if it's one of your "free ones". Quick Snares at lvl 6 allows you to do so with Any snare. Lightning Snares allows you to do so in 1 action.
I agree with all that.
But I still don't see a way of making 4 snares in 1 action.
The problem stems from using a Downtime Activity to craft snares in combat. The downtime activity Craft doesn't take into account anything about location.
Where does it say anything about location at all? Why can't I have my character exist in all places at once? Why can't leave my sword in one square, move to another, and still attack with it? Why can't I have 20 arms, each with a different weapon?
We need to make some basic assumptions to play the game. Being unable to craft things 500km away, on a different plane, seem like one of them.
If a spell had a Range that was blank, wouldn't you think there should be an errata for that? Why not for Snares?
Sure. I see no reason why to not add "adjacent square'. It's not like it would hurt anything.
And it seems semi-reasonable that someone who never built a snare might think you could "throw" down a trap 20' away.
Read Snare Specialist again. You can place a snare that takes 1 minute to craft normally in 3 actions... if it's one of your "free ones". Quick Snares at lvl 6 allows you to do so with Any snare. Lightning Snares allows you to do so in 1 action.I agree with all that.
But I still don't see a way of making 4 snares in 1 action.
The problem stems from using a Downtime Activity to craft snares in combat. The downtime activity Craft doesn't take into account anything about location.Where does it say anything about location at all? Why can't I have my character exist in all places at once? Why can't leave my sword in one square, move to another, and still attack with it? Why can't I have 20 arms, each with a different weapon?
We need to make some basic assumptions to play the game. Being unable to craft things 500km away, on a different plane, seem like one of them.
If a spell had a Range that was blank, wouldn't you think there should be an errata for that? Why not for Snares?Sure. I see no reason why to not add "adjacent square'. It's not like it would hurt anything.
And it seems semi-reasonable that someone who never built a snare might think you could "throw" down a trap 20' away.
As stated over and over again the problem comes with using the Craft activity in combat. At the end of the Craft section it states that you can craft items with the Consumable trait in batches of 4. The Craft activity only ever talks about creating a single item at a time, then makes an exception for consumables after the fact. Since All snares are consumables, it's not unreasonable to come to the conclusion that you can craft 4 of them in place as part of your placing one for Snare Specialist.
For the second point, sure you don't exist in 500 different places etc... at once. The rules are actually more clear about that than you are giving them credit for, since you are assumed to inhabit one 5 foot square/ a set of squares large enough to house your form. The problem is that there is no baseline assumption for where you can craft something in combat, because nobody else is reasonably assumed to be crafting in combat.
It may seem like it should go without saying. But rules are there for a reason. They at the very least set your baseline assumption of how things are supposed to be done in the game.
And in this case, they do so badly. So badly that I don't fault anyone who comes to the conclusion that Jim the Ranger can place 4 biting snares in one 5 foot square for 3 actions. Because the rules are pretty clear on that being a possible thing.
Hence why I would like this addressed.
As stated over and over again the problem comes with using the Craft activity in combat. At the end of the Craft section it states that you can craft items with the Consumable trait in batches of 4. The Craft activity only ever talks about creating a single item at a time, then makes an exception for consumables after the fact. Since All snares are consumables, it's not unreasonable to come to the conclusion that you can craft 4 of them in place as part of your placing one for Snare Specialist.
If you just skimmed the rules, I could see how you could come to that conclusion.
But, if you fully read them.
"You can spend 1 minute to Craft a snare at its listed Price. If you want to Craft a snare at a discount, you must spend downtime as described in the Craft activity." 1 minute= 1 snare.
You can use the regular crafting (batch, 4 days) as well.
"When you create a snare that normally takes 1 minute to Craft"
1 action snare = 1 snare.
As stated over and over again the problem comes with using the Craft activity in combat. At the end of the Craft section it states that you can craft items with the Consumable trait in batches of 4. The Craft activity only ever talks about creating a single item at a time, then makes an exception for consumables after the fact. Since All snares are consumables, it's not unreasonable to come to the conclusion that you can craft 4 of them in place as part of your placing one for Snare Specialist.If you just skimmed the rules, I could see how you could come to that conclusion.
But, if you fully read them.
"You can spend 1 minute to Craft a snare at its listed Price. If you want to Craft a snare at a discount, you must spend downtime as described in the Craft activity." 1 minute= 1 snare.
You can use the regular crafting (batch, 4 days) as well."When you create a snare that normally takes 1 minute to Craft"
1 action snare = 1 snare.
Sure. I believe that is the intent. Unfortunately the rules aren't that clear about that. You use the standard craft activity to place a snare. The standard craft activity allows for consumables to be batch crafted with no added time. The only rider is they all have to be finished at the same time.
Soooo yes. You can according to the rules craft up to 4 snares at the same time. And since "placing" a snare uses the rules for "crafting" a snare... You can do so in combat for 3 actions with Snare Specialist.
I don't think this is the intent, nor do I think this is a good thing for the game. But the wording of the rules completely allow for this. Hence: Errata needed.
Edit: I feel like you are under the assumption that you carry around ready made snares. This is not the case. Every snare must be crafted in it's place. You can't "carry around" a biting snare. You craft it where you want to deploy it. This gets weird when you consider the "free" Snares provided by Snare Specialist. Indeed even these Snares do not themselves count as items. They do not have a Bulk or take up any space on the Ranger. The only time they impact the world at all is when they are "crafted" in place.
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The fact that even if a few people can read it and get put out 4 snares at a time is a problem. a problem that can be addressed with a few lines.
suggested wording as a base line.
For deploying snares.
"a snare is built within a single adjacent 5 foot square."
bold my addition
To cut off the crafting in batches problem add in
"when crafting a snare in 1 minute or less they can not be crafted in batches."
To stop the stacking snares problem.
"snares cannot occupy the same space as another snare and/or trap."
As an extra thing to stop crazy base defenses for ranger snares in the ranger feat "snare specialist" add in.
"snares created using this feat last until your next daily preparations"
And a last line that bugs me in snare specialist that can be read different ways. make it more clear when/ if you gain more formulas as you increase in proficiency in crafting, as you could pick the feat up when you are a master or legendary and get a different number of formulas total depending on how it is read.
"If your rank is at or increases to master, you gain 6. If your rank is at or increases to legendary, you gain 6."
It might not be the best way to phrase things but it would hopefully stop anyone having to have a talk like this one with the gm.
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Sure. I believe that is the intent. Unfortunately the rules aren't that clear about that. You use the standard craft activity to place a snare. The standard craft activity allows for consumables to be batch crafted with no added time. The only rider is they all have to be finished at the same time.
The standard craft activity takes 4 days. In which you can craft a batch of snares.
The craft snare rules says "1 minute to Craft a snare at its listed Price."
So it provides 3 exceptions...
*1 minute (instead of 4 days)
*a snare (instead of a batch)
*listed price (instead of half price)
The other snare feats only apply to the 1 minute (single, full price) snare.
But hey, I'm not your DM, so play how you like.
Sure. I believe that is the intent. Unfortunately the rules aren't that clear about that. You use the standard craft activity to place a snare. The standard craft activity allows for consumables to be batch crafted with no added time. The only rider is they all have to be finished at the same time.The standard craft activity takes 4 days. In which you can craft a batch of snares.
The craft snare rules says "1 minute to Craft a snare at its listed Price."
So it provides 3 exceptions...
*1 minute (instead of 4 days)
*a snare (instead of a batch)
*listed price (instead of half price)The other snare feats only apply to the 1 minute (single, full price) snare.
But hey, I'm not your DM, so play how you like.
As a houserule to discourage abuse I have set down that snares cannot be placed in the same 5 foot square as another Snare. Additionally a ranger can only "craft" one snare at a time using his 3 action feats. Snares can still be crafted in batches during downtime, but their locations cannot be an unreasonable distance apart (read this as usually in the same "room" or area) otherwise they do not count as a batch and must be crafted singularly with separate checks.
In my Very first post, I posted these house rules that I'm instituting in my game... Why do you think I made this post?
A list of things that the Crafting Snares rules do not Exempt Snares from: Batch Crafting, Crafting multiple Snares into the same square, Snare Specialist Rangers from having free snares.
Look, I don't know if you think that I'm trying to say this is how Snares should be done. What I am trying to say is that the rules are ambiguous and do not work as probably intended by the developers. This means... le sigh, that they should be Errata'd. Your interpretation of the rules is closer to how I believe they should be ran, but the Honest truth is that the rules are not written in a way that makes your interpretation true. They simply are not.
Argue with me all you want. I'm not the one who wrote the rules. I want to see them brought in line with other specialty rules in the game. Sorry that you don't seem to care.
Edit: Added my own quote about house rules...
For an example let's look at the Alchemist's Quick Alchemy action. It states very clearly that you, "...create a single alchemical item of
your advanced alchemy level or lower that’s in your formula book without having to spend the normal monetary cost in alchemical reagents or needing to attempt a Crafting check."
Why couldn't they use wording like this for Snare Specialist? That would immediately end the discussion. But instead we get the more vague,"Each day during your daily preparations, you can prepare four snares from your formula book for quick deployment; if they normally take 1 minute to Craft, you can Craft them with 3 Interact actions." Which does nothing to say exactly how many snares can be made in a turn, or where or how you can make them. You can interpret that rule as saying you can make one snare per 3 action deployment, but that is an interpretation. Once you go to the Craft rules to see exactly what you have to do to make that snare, you are led to the Consumables and Ammunition bit that make it seem that you can for all intents and purposes deploy 4 snares in that time.
And why wouldn't you be able to? If you "prepared" them in advance, why couldn't you slap down 4 of those bad boys in one turn?
This is what rules exist for. To fill in the blanks and let us know exactly what is and is not possible.
Alright. Common sense. We'll go with that.
So caltrop snares are basically just bags of caltrops tied to a line right? So if I'm already able to string the line and place one in 6 seconds, why not 4? Doesn't seem that hard, I could probably do it in real life.
Biting snares are basically just Bear Traps. If I can already place one in 6 seconds, an already impressive feat, why not 4? Especially if they are already pre-set up right?
Or how about this gem, Hail of Arrows Snare. A level 16 Legendary Craft Ranger can carry 16 apparently pre-made Hail of Arrows Snares which apparently have 0 bulk, and can be deployed in something like 2 seconds with lightning snares (even assuming you discount the idea that they can be batch crafted) even though they are described as blanketing an area in Hundreds Of Arrows.
Run out of arrows for your bow? Well, hope you weren't expecting to be able to use one of the 10,000 arrows your carrying in your pocket for those bad boys, they don't really exist.
Common Sense does not always apply to Tabletop RPG's. It's a bad argument.
There is a difference between "this rule goes against common sense but we follow the rules" and "this isn't covered by the rules therefore we can do anything and that's stupid so the rules aren't working." Declaring that you dont have to be next to something to manipulate it because the rules don't say one way or the other is the latter.
Sure. I fully agree with you. And if the rules agreed with you, we wouldn't have a problem. The problem isn't what the rules don't say, "one way or the other," it is what the rules say you can do.
Unless your talking about the idea that you can prep a snare in a non-adjacent square. In which case, yeah, that's stretching. But why don't the rules say where you can and can't place that Snare?
I don't understand why I'm getting so much push back here. Give the Snare rules a read. Tell me that you think they don't need some work. At best they are "buggy". At worst they are flat out broken.
You could say incompletely designed.
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I think that the snare batches thing is a case of specific beats general - the section on crafting snares states that you can make one snare in one minute, OR use the normal downtime crafting rules (in which case the rules regarding making 4 consumables at a time apply).
Also, GMs making rulings and choosing how to adjudicate actions is the core principle of how d&d and pathfinder (and most ttrpgs) work, so rules that require that are not a failure of game design. People should stop being afraid of GMs making decisions. (Like, seriously, players asking people to GM for them, then liking when they choose to do the things that separate a living human GM from a game book or video game is really sad, because those things are part of what makes a human GM so much better than a gamebook or video game)
I think that the snare batches thing is a case of specific beats general - the section on crafting snares states that you can make one snare in one minute, OR use the normal downtime crafting rules (in which case the rules regarding making 4 consumables at a time apply).
Also, GMs making rulings and choosing how to adjudicate actions is the core principle of how d&d and pathfinder (and most ttrpgs) work, so rules that require that are not a failure of game design. People should stop being afraid of GMs making decisions. (Like, seriously, players asking people to GM for them, then liking when they choose to do the things that separate a living human GM from a game book or video game is really sad, because those things are part of what makes a human GM so much better than a gamebook or video game)
That excuses what looks like for all intents and purposes a slap dash general mechanic? GM rulings definitely have their place, but when an entire mechanic from one end to the other require rulings to work in a way that isn't silly, why shouldn't Paizo update and errata those rules?
Do they have 0 responsibility to ensure that the rules that you paid for (or didn't for some of those in the audience) are as complete and balanced as they can provide?
I will be the first to recognize that they were probably vastly busy when designing PF 2.0. I can see how some mechanics can be overlooked, especially a new and pretty specific mechanic specifically for one class. But that doesn't mean that they shouldn't update and errata said rules.
That's all I'm asking for. Bring the Ranger Snare rules up to snuff with other classes specialties. Right now it feels like they spent a handful of hours and figured, "Job Done." without really working out how a player is supposed to make these things work. And the possibilities really run the gamut.
From one perspective, Snares Suck. They take a lot of actions to get in place, are relatively expensive and you cannot pick them back up.
From another they are borked as all heck. Placing multiple snares in the same square and creating silly death stars.
It's telling that Snare Specialist is the only feat I can find that gives you recipes for it's specialty of Any level, common or uncommon. That seems lazy. Why not give you a new snare formula every level? Instead you get a dump of them when you take the feat, then a few more every time your Crafting training goes up. This is the only crafting feat I can find that works this way.
This leads me to believe that it is exactly what it feels like: Thrown together and left unfinished for later.
So finish em.
I think that the snare batches thing is a case of specific beats general - the section on crafting snares states that you can make one snare in one minute, OR use the normal downtime crafting rules (in which case the rules regarding making 4 consumables at a time apply).
Also, GMs making rulings and choosing how to adjudicate actions is the core principle of how d&d and pathfinder (and most ttrpgs) work, so rules that require that are not a failure of game design. People should stop being afraid of GMs making decisions. (Like, seriously, players asking people to GM for them, then liking when they choose to do the things that separate a living human GM from a game book or video game is really sad, because those things are part of what makes a human GM so much better than a gamebook or video game)
That excuses what looks like for all intents and purposes a slap dash general mechanic? GM rulings definitely have their place, but when an entire mechanic from one end to the other require rulings to work in a way that isn't silly, why shouldn't Paizo update and errata those rules?
Do they have 0 responsibility to ensure that the rules that you paid for (or didn't for some of those in the audience) are as complete and balanced as they can provide?
I will be the first to recognize that they were probably vastly busy when designing PF 2.0. I can see how some mechanics can be overlooked, especially a new and pretty specific mechanic specifically for one class. But that doesn't mean that they shouldn't update and errata said rules.
That's all I'm asking for. Bring the Ranger Snare rules up to snuff with other classes specialties. Right now it feels like they spent a handful of hours and figured, "Job Done." without really working out how a player is supposed to make these things work. And the possibilities really run the gamut.
From one perspective, Snares Suck. They take a lot of actions to get in place, are relatively expensive and you cannot pick them back up....
That's the thing though, I believe that your opinion that the rules are incomplete is largely unfounded, due to reasons that both myself and others have explained in this thread. I think that the rules for snare crafting are complete as they are, and that a faq is only required to explain that rule in a clear way to people who aren't interpreting it correctly (which is what about 60% of errata/faq entries for rpgs generally are, just clarifications for people who have difficulty interpreting the rules)
Though I suspect that you will find ways to poke holes in or dismiss any opinion that conflicts with the narrative that you want to push of pf2 being rushed.
That's the thing though, I believe that your opinion that the rules are incomplete is largely unfounded, due to reasons that both myself and others have explained in this thread. I think that the rules for snare crafting are complete as they are, and that a faq is only required to explain that rule in a clear way to people who aren't interpreting it correctly (which is what about 60% of errata/faq entries for rpgs generally are, just clarifications for people who have difficulty interpreting the rules)
Though I suspect that you will find ways to poke holes in or dismiss any opinion that conflicts with the narrative that you want to push of pf2 being rushed.
Pushing a Narrative? I was just complaining about some unbalanced rules. Sure, others have posted that they don't see anything wrong with the way that the Snare Specialist rules interact with Snare Crafting etc... But not one of them has explained why they work together. Instead the answer is the GM houserule. Which fair enough, is an option. But why should a GM have to houserule an entire mechanic to make it work? Would you be okay with that being the case for Spellcasting? Or Alchemist Bombs?
The difference between Snares and either of those examples is that you clearly know what is and is not possible and when it is possible with those mechanics. You know when you can and can't cast a spell. What you can target with it.
Can you place a Snare in the same 5 foot square that a creature is already inhabiting? If so, and they are not searching for the Snare, can they try to disarm it? Or do they still have to have the prerequisite Perception training to see your Snare in the first place, even though you set it in their square?
What perception level are goblins trained to? Because the rules for Snares state that, "As you become better at creating snares, your snares become harder to detect by those with lesser ability. If you are an expert in Crafting, only a creature that is trained in Perception can find your snares; if you are a master in Crafting, only a creature that is an expert in Perception can find your snares; and if you are legendary in Crafting, only a creature that is a master in Perception can find your snares."
No monster profile that I am aware of tells you whether or not a monster is trained, expert, etc... in perception. So can any monster find your Snare? Or just some? Why?
The rules for Snares are incomplete.
The designers shouldn't have to hold your hand through every last corner case.
Goblins are trained, gnoll cultists are expert. It's not hard to tell.
The designers shouldn't have to hold your hand through every last corner case.
Goblins are trained, gnoll cultists are expert. It's not hard to tell.
Alrighty then. Do me a favor and run me through the exact steps that a 4th level Ranger with Expert rank in Craft, Craft Snares and Snare Specialist would use to deploy his daily prepared Biting Snares. Assume that the Ranger will be doing so in combat. Assume he is for whatever reason solo fighting a Gnoll Sergeant and otherwise has no method of attacking the Sergeant, for the sake of argument and to keep things simple. We'll say that you are fighting in a 5x5 5 foot square room with no terrain, and that you begin on opposite sides. The Ranger wins initiative in this scenario.
Keep separate any and all decisions that you had to make as the GM and note them at each step of the process.
I am curious what such an experienced and veteran GM thinks of the overall experience, and how viable and fun the mechanic is.
Alrighty then. Do me a favor and run me through the exact steps that a 4th level Ranger with Expert rank in Craft, Craft Snares and Snare Specialist would use to deploy his daily prepared Biting Snares. Assume that the Ranger will be doing so in combat. Assume he is for whatever reason solo fighting a Gnoll Sergeant and otherwise has no method of attacking the Sergeant, for the sake of argument and to keep things simple. We'll say that you are fighting in a 5x5 5 foot square room with no terrain, and that you begin on opposite sides. The Ranger wins initiative in this scenario.Keep separate any and all decisions that you had to make as the GM and note them at each step of the process.
I am curious what such an experienced and veteran GM thinks of the overall experience, and how viable and fun the mechanic is.
I will clarify a bit on the challenge: Your objective is not to win the engagement, you are basically a hamstrung character so will not likely win. Your objective is to successfully use the Snare Specialist mechanic in Combat (where it is intended to be used) and to test the efficacy thereof. The Gnoll Sergeant will move to engage every turn, but you do not have to roll attacks with it. Assume the Ranger has lost if they have either used all of their traps and not killed the Gnoll or for whatever reason can not deploy all of their snares.
Your objective is to successfully use the Snare Specialist mechanic in Combat (where it is intended to be used)
I see no reason to think it is interned to be used in combat. Just in situations like "I scouted ahead, and the enemy is marching down the path so let's set an ambush". Or "we hide in this side room, and try to take a 10 minute break, so I set up some alarms in case".
Lighting for combat, sure.
Well, encounter mode is the only time you track number of actions. Usually, that's synonymous with combat, but not always.
So, it's a bit niche, but if you're using initiative order to track noncombat activities against, for example the speed of a patrol coming by, you might have reason for fast snare setting to matter.
That being said, a 5x5 room with clear line of sight, no allies, a single enemy and no terrain sounds like the worst possible case for trying to get a good experience out of setting snares in combat.
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Could you tell me how you figured that? The Gnoll Cultist for example has a +8 perception. I figure 3 Wis + 3 level + 2 trained. Not sure how you decided expert.The designers shouldn't have to hold your hand through every last corner case.
Goblins are trained, gnoll cultists are expert. It's not hard to tell.
There is a general rule for this in the Bestiary.
Skills, Perception, and Proficiency
In some situations, such as when a creature is trying to Disable a PC’s snare, you need to know the creature’s proficiency rank. Creatures are trained in the skills listed in their stat blocks. Because monsters aren’t created using the same rules as PCs, they are untrained in skills that aren’t listed. A creature usually has expert proficiency in its listed skills around 5th level, master proficiency around 9th level, and legendary proficiency around 17th level. A creature might need a certain proficiency rank in Perception to detect certain things. Many creatures have expert proficiency in Perception, and improve to master proficiency around 7th level and legendary proficiency around 13th level.
And of course, it goes on to say that there may be exceptions at GM discretion.
You, as a GM, can figure out what would work best for the encounter.
Could you tell me how you figured that? The Gnoll Cultist for example has a +8 perception. I figure 3 Wis + 3 level + 2 trained. Not sure how you decided expert.The designers shouldn't have to hold your hand through every last corner case.
Goblins are trained, gnoll cultists are expert. It's not hard to tell.
There is a general rule for this in the Bestiary.
Skills, Perception, and Proficiency, etc...
That being said, a 5x5 room with clear line of sight, no allies, a single enemy and no terrain sounds like the worst possible case for trying to get a good experience out of setting snares in combat.
Good Find! I can't tell you how much this was bugging me man.
The intention is not to be a good fight, or even a reasonably realistic fight. It is simply intended as a medium to examine the use of Snares in combat, which Snare Specialist enables.
My personal feelings on the Snare is that it is part of what the Ranger was given in place of it's PF1 spellcasting. Snares give the Ranger a niche way of denying an area, (something spells can do) or inflicting conditions (another spell thing) and even doing damage (more spell stuff) in a way that is different than other classes. Lightning Snares reducing the action usage to a single interact is basically only useful in combat, so why shouldn't Snares be viable in combat?
You, as a GM, can figure out what would work best for the encounter.
Sure, and if you have a player that picks up Snares you now have to take extra time during encounter planning to figure out every creatures training level in perception (which is still not concrete even accounting for the rule on pg. 7).
But that doesn't answer the key question of the thread. Are the Snare Rules in a reasonable and usable state? Your opinion may differ but I feel that if you have to house rule a mechanic at pretty much every step, the answer is no.
Nearly every poster in this thread has stated that they believe you should only be able to place a single Snare at a time. I agree with this.
Nearly every poster in this thread agrees that you shouldn't be allowed to multi-stack snares to ridiculous levels. I also agree with this.
So is it ridiculous to want an errata clarifying the use of Snares? I don't think so. It's why I posted in the first place.
Thanks, but that means even more work for me.
I mean, if you don't want to adjudicate on a case by case basis, you can use the guideline in the book though, right? So not really.
But "many" isn't really much of a guideline. Is that mean about half? Or almost all of them? I mean many people play roleplaying games, but a cannot expect any random group of people to have a gamer in it.I mean, if you don't want to adjudicate on a case by case basis, you can use the guideline in the book though, right? So not really.
Thanks, but that means even more work for me.
It is entirely reasonable that Paizo left the rules for determining monster skill training ambiguous in purpose to give the GM flexibility. Seems to me that an example of that rule in play sidebar would be a nice addition, if for no other reason to give us something to base our decisions on. Not needed per se, but would be handy.