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No limit use cantrips were a thing in PF1, and not hard to get, but now pretty much any ancestry can grab a cantrip with no power or levelling, merely from being born. The system in general and Golarion in particular are very high-magic settings, how does this affect the ordinary person?
Heritages matter and are relevant to even the lowliest NPC, consider the Cavern or Desert Elf's Darkvision or heat protection for example. Similarly, an unlimited use cantrip is quite an ordinary thing for many otherwise ordinary folk.I'd like to explore how these might work in the game, and perhaps in the game's in-world society.
- STABILIZE is superb. That and profiency in medicine make a perfectly capable village nurse or the lay clergy for someone like Sarenrae.
- MESSAGE has many ordinary uses. Gossips, government officials, criminals - but also consider the uses in a high-magic, low-tech city. Have an NPC with this cantrip in the town's best inn and have links to the receptionist in the town hall. This is a basis for rudimentary telecommunications.
- PRESTIDIGITATION is fun, and I'd expect children's entertainers to spam it. It also has the tidy and cook capabilities - the head chef at Magnimar's best restaurant spams it. The ultra fast but expensive dry cleaner spams it.
- JOIN PASTS is for diplomats and marriage counsellers.
- LIGHT is for explorers and guides. Perhaps very lavish aristocrats employ Light casters instead of candles?
- PRODUCE FLAME has many practical uses. Lamplighters, firestarters etc. I can imagine a tundra guide with no fighting ability but some Survival skill and this cantrip being a very employable NPC.
- CHILL TOUCH. I have seen a reference in Curse of Plaguestone that this can be used to make ice from normal water. There you go. Chill Touch can make ice. useful for preservation and bartending.
- Most of the offensive cantrips are not much use for NPC jobs and may make the person unwelcome in their little society, but even then I can imgaine ACID SPLASH being useful in something like mining or cleaning work.
- GUIDANCE is extremely useful for PCs and no less for NPCs. It works in every walk of life - a quick boost to your Diplomacy as a beaurocrat, a help with your smithing, etc.
No published adventure I have seen has these minor tricks yet in a setting with access to such magic being trivial, wouldn't they be used? Would there not be a niche?
Ideas very welcome.
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STABILIZE is superb. That and profiency in medicine make a perfectly capable village nurse or the lay clergy for someone like Sarenrae.
You still need to get within range of your target within 18 seconds or less for this cantrip to be useful outside of combat (if you have more than 18s, then the patient probably stabilized on their own), which makes it less than superb in my opinion. In combat, it's main value is avoiding the Opportunity Attacks you might otherwise provoke without the spell's range.
EDIT: Just remembered NPCs don't use Dying rules unless the GM specifically wants them to (for villagers, 0 HP = DEAD), so this cantrip is essentially worthless when not dealing with PCs.
MESSAGE has many ordinary uses. Gossips, government officials, criminals - but also consider the uses in a high-magic, low-tech city. Have an NPC with this cantrip in the town's best inn and have links to the receptionist in the town hall. This is a basis for rudimentary telecommunications.
120 foot range and Line of Sight / Effect requirements really narrows the utility of this one.
PRESTIDIGITATION is fun, and I'd expect children's entertainers to spam it. It also has the tidy and cook capabilities - the head chef at Magnimar's best restaurant spams it. The ultra fast but expensive dry cleaner spams it.
Yep, this one should probably see a fair amount of use
JOIN PASTS is for diplomats and marriage counsellers.
Don't know this one, so I can't comment on it.
LIGHT is for explorers and guides. Perhaps very lavish aristocrats employ Light casters instead of candles?
Since you can only have one 'active' use of this cantrip at a time per caster, it's unlikely to be used for more than personal light
PRODUCE FLAME has many practical uses. Lamplighters, firestarters etc. I can imagine a tundra guide with no fighting ability but some Survival skill and this cantrip being a very employable NPC.
This cantrip shouldn't be remarkably more effective than a simple 'flint and steel' in most cases so I can't see this as a 'selling point.'
CHILL TOUCH. I have seen a reference in Curse of Plaguestone that this can be used to make ice from normal water. There you go. Chill Touch can make ice. useful for preservation and bartending.
This cantrip actually does 'Negative' damage rather than 'cold', so it can't really be used to make ice...
- Most of the offensive cantrips are not much use for NPC jobs and may make the person unwelcome in their little society, but even then I can imgaine ACID SPLASH being useful in something like mining or cleaning work.
- GUIDANCE is extremely useful for PCs and no less for NPCs. It works in every walk of life - a quick boost to your Diplomacy as a beaurocrat, a help with your smithing, etc.
Guidance has a really short duration (until the start of your next turn) so it can't really be used on anything that takes any time to complete. Likewise, pausing your negotiations to cast a spell is likely to create immediate distrust...
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If you want to see where this line of thinking goes, you end up with Eberron. It's a big part of why I like that setting so much.
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STABILIZE is superb. That and profiency in medicine make a perfectly capable village nurse or the lay clergy for someone like Sarenrae.You still need to get within range of your target within 18 seconds or less for this cantrip to be useful outside of combat (if you have more than 18s, then the patient probably stabilized on their own), which makes it less than superb in my opinion. In combat, it's main value is avoiding the Opportunity Attacks you might otherwise provoke without the spell's range.
EDIT: Just remembered NPCs don't use Dying rules unless the GM specifically wants them to (for villagers, 0 HP = DEAD), so this cantrip is essentially worthless when not dealing with PCs.
NPCs die at 0 HP because in most cases it's not interesting (but cumbersome) to track their dying status. I would not mix up what is usually handwaived in combat for the good of the game, with how things work in the background.
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I understand these direct rules interpretations of these spell, but my question was more about how casual use of magic makes a difference in the world. Keftiu gets where I'm going with this, PF2 makes more low-level magic ordinary, like Eberron. Very ordinary, 0 level NPCs can cast spells and create alchemical objects.
Ideally, the theme of this question is less whether e.g. Chill Touch does negative or cold damage, rather it is how trivial magic interacts with the environment and setting.
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It’s not handwaving, it’s the actual rule.NPCs die at 0 HP because in most cases it's not interesting (but cumbersome) to track their dying status. I would not mix up what is usually handwaived in combat for the good of the game, with how things work in the background.STABILIZE is superb. That and profiency in medicine make a perfectly capable village nurse or the lay clergy for someone like Sarenrae.You still need to get within range of your target within 18 seconds or less for this cantrip to be useful outside of combat (if you have more than 18s, then the patient probably stabilized on their own), which makes it less than superb in my opinion. In combat, it's main value is avoiding the Opportunity Attacks you might otherwise provoke without the spell's range.
EDIT: Just remembered NPCs don't use Dying rules unless the GM specifically wants them to (for villagers, 0 HP = DEAD), so this cantrip is essentially worthless when not dealing with PCs.
Creatures cannot be reduced to fewer than 0 Hit Points. When most creatures reach 0 Hit Points, they die and are removed from play unless the attack was nonlethal, in which case they are instead knocked out for a significant amount of time (usually 1 minute or more). When undead and construct creatures reach 0 Hit Points, they are destroyed. Player characters, their companions, and other significant characters and creatures don't automatically die when they reach 0 Hit Points. Instead, they are knocked out and are at risk of death. At the GM's discretion, villains, powerful monsters, special NPCs, and enemies with special abilities that are likely to bring them back to the fight (like ferocity, regeneration, or healing magic) can use these rules as well.
It’s the GM’s choice if they want to use the Dying rules for NPCs, but the standard rule is that they don’t.
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The 120ft range of message would be plenty useful in a senate building or other bureaucratic building. Everyone would know it is happening since it has a verbal component, but they wouldn't know what was said, so I think you could craft a very interesting courtroom scene where aides in the back of the room are communicating with the primary lawyers.
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I really like how Jason handles people using prestidigitation in the Band of Bravos live stream, requiring skill checks in the relevant tradition skill to see how effectively it does the thing the player wants. So it might be functional on a level 0 NPC, but the quality would be apparent even in the effectiveness of its cleaning, for example.
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The vast majority of the NPCs in the world don't have magic, and thus can't use cantrips. Just because it's an automatic option for PCs if they make specific choices during character creation isn't meant to imply that cantrip casting NPCs are as widespread as farmers, bakers, town guards, merchants, and the rest of the world. Magic is meant to be magic in Golarion, not everyday normal. Feel free to adjust that norm in your game as you wish, of course.
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Understanding the minutae of dying rules is great, and relevant for PC battles. I want to know about a Pathfinder rules world like Golarion works where NPC magic is ordinary and nothing special.
Cantrips don't change much: When they became unlimited usage, they were 'nerfed' to prevent them from having a potentially significant impact on the world.
Of the Cantrips you listed, only Prestidigitation seems like it could be fairly common, but even then the actual impact would be minimal (chores become a little easier).
Finally, you might want to keep in mind that NPCs don't generally get to choose from a list of options: They happen to pick something up from their parents or upbringing, which leaves a fair number of options 'off the table'. Unlike PCs, NPCs don't get the luxury of picking their parents and backstory...
The vast majority of the NPCs in the world don't have magic, and thus can't use cantrips. Just because it's an automatic option for PCs if they make specific choices during character creation isn't meant to imply that cantrip casting NPCs are as widespread as farmers, bakers, town guards, merchants, and the rest of the world. Magic is meant to be magic in Golarion, not everyday normal. Feel free to adjust that norm in your game as you wish, of course.
Was just about to say what James said in a much more concise fashion. So, I will just say, I concur with James. That is how I have always understood Golarion. PCs are not NPCs and vice versa.
It’s not handwaving, it’s the actual rule.NPCs die at 0 HP because in most cases it's not interesting (but cumbersome) to track their dying status. I would not mix up what is usually handwaived in combat for the good of the game, with how things work in the background.STABILIZE is superb. That and profiency in medicine make a perfectly capable village nurse or the lay clergy for someone like Sarenrae.You still need to get within range of your target within 18 seconds or less for this cantrip to be useful outside of combat (if you have more than 18s, then the patient probably stabilized on their own), which makes it less than superb in my opinion. In combat, it's main value is avoiding the Opportunity Attacks you might otherwise provoke without the spell's range.
EDIT: Just remembered NPCs don't use Dying rules unless the GM specifically wants them to (for villagers, 0 HP = DEAD), so this cantrip is essentially worthless when not dealing with PCs.
Creatures cannot be reduced to fewer than 0 Hit Points. When most creatures reach 0 Hit Points, they die and are removed from play unless the attack was nonlethal, in which case they are instead knocked out for a significant amount of time (usually 1 minute or more). When undead and construct creatures reach 0 Hit Points, they are destroyed. Player characters, their companions, and other significant characters and creatures don't automatically die when they reach 0 Hit Points. Instead, they are knocked out and are at risk of death. At the GM's discretion, villains, powerful monsters, special NPCs, and enemies with special abilities that are likely to bring them back to the fight (like ferocity, regeneration, or healing magic) can use these rules as well.It’s the GM’s choice if they want to use the Dying rules for NPCs, but the standard rule is that they don’t.
I don't think this matters to the question of how ordinary people live their lives, at all. The abstraction of injury into hit points isn't part of how people live their day to day lives. I would say that if someone in a given village actually has some magical healing ability, even stabilize, it's a significant ability (though nowhere near the miraculous things a major apellcaster can do), not a trivial party trick that you should assume everyone learns.
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Just because cantrips are available to PCs via heritages, that does not mean NPCs are. PCs are special.
I'd slightly disagree with this.
It being a PC option means it's an option for NPCs as well...but it doesn't follow at all that all options are equally common, and characters don't get to choose which ones they get (players do, but that's a meta-concern, not something in-world).
It's not a stretch at all to say that cantrip-providing Heritages or Ancestry Feats are among the rarest for people to possess in-universe, and perhaps usually possessed by those with other magic to boot.
Which, as James Jacobs says, means the vast majority of people don't have it. In my population demographics thread based on the PF1 settlement rules, I once figured the number of casters at no more than 5% of the population, with most of those pretty low level. I haven't seen anything in PF2 that inclines me to think that number has changed. Other parts of that analysis probably need to be massaged to take PF2's new rules into account (mostly 'NPCs of PC Classes' has stopped being much of a meaningful term), but not that part.
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I don't think this matters to the question of how ordinary people live their lives, at all. The abstraction of injury into hit points isn't part of how people live their day to day lives. I would say that if someone in a given village actually has some magical healing ability, even stabilize, it's a significant ability (though nowhere near the miraculous things a major apellcaster can do), not a trivial party trick that you should assume everyone learns.
Cantrip, Healing, Necromancy, Positive
Traditions divine, primal
Cast Two Actions somatic, verbal
Range 30 feet;
Targets 1 dying creature
Positive energy shuts death's door. The target loses the dying condition, though it remains unconscious at 0 Hit Points.
When Bob the Baker slips and falls off the roof of his building and is reduced to 0 hit points from falling damage, he is DEAD rather than DYING unless the GM decides he is somehow 'significant' enough to the story to use the PC dying rules. Even if Phil the Physician is standing right there, Bob's mangled body is a corpse rather than a 'dying creature' and thus not a valid target for Stabilize.
To put it another way, if Bob the Baker and Peter the PC both fall off the roof and lose all their health to falling damage, then:
- Peter is mostly dead and can be stabilized / healed.
- Bob is completely dead and the only thing you can do is go through his pockets for loose change...
Unless they've actually seen it used on a PC / Significant NPC, most inhabitants of a game world wouldn't even know the Stabilize spell exists, and those who do know it exists would likely write it off as mostly useless as it won't work on anyone they are ever likely to meet...
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To put it another way, if Bob the Baker and Peter the PC both fall off the roof and lose all their health to falling damage, then:
- Peter is mostly dead and can be stabilized / healed.
- Bob is completely dead and the only thing you can do is go through his pockets for loose change...
Yes, correct, and yet you are missing the point.
Fine, this is the Paizo forum. I should have known people are only interested in the mechanics rather than the lore.
What happens in a Gnome village?
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To put it another way, if Bob the Baker and Peter the PC both fall off the roof and lose all their health to falling damage, then:
- Peter is mostly dead and can be stabilized / healed.
- Bob is completely dead and the only thing you can do is go through his pockets for loose change...
Yes, correct, and yet you are missing the point.
Fine, this is the Paizo forum. I should have known people are only interested in the mechanics rather than the lore.
What happens in a Gnome village?
That's what I'm saying. Bob may fall off a roof in a village one day. They may be badly injured, and dying (note the lower case. I am not saying referring to the rules condition Dying). Wanda the Wise Woman who has a minor magical ability may be able to save Bob's life, so that it's possible to nurse him back to health. This is a big deal, and when Louis the Lumberjack gets pinned under a tree, someone will be sent running to fetch Wanda.
No part of these events have to invoke hit point totals, the text of the stabilize spell or the general application of the Dying condition to be things that happen in the world on a given Fourthday.
To put it another way, if Bob the Baker and Peter the PC both fall off the roof and lose all their health to falling damage, then:
- Peter is mostly dead and can be stabilized / healed.
- Bob is completely dead and the only thing you can do is go through his pockets for loose change...
Yes, correct, and yet you are missing the point.
Fine, this is the Paizo forum. I should have known people are only interested in the mechanics rather than the lore.
What happens in a Gnome village?
Further up you got a lore answer from the creative director of the company. You are probably not going to get any more "from the source" than that
Just because PCs have multiple ways of getting cantrips it doesn't mean NPCs do. Character built like PCs are incredibly rare.
If we assume that the majority of the population are level -1 or 0 characters then per the GMG only the Adept from that list has cantrips. And I wouldn't imagine there are many of those either.
And then if you look at page 204 it tells you how you make them all Gnomes. And adding the ancestry cantrip feats is not the route. For a "Gnome Village" you take everyone as written in the GMG NPC section and give them low light vision and Sylvan. Put simply NPCs do not even get ancestry feats
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Or..feats, for the most part.
But I’m with Keftiu. I like the idea of certain kind of magic being as common as salt, and Eberron was my favorite setting for a while in the strength of that assumption.
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To put it another way, if Bob the Baker and Peter the PC both fall off the roof and lose all their health to falling damage, then:
- Peter is mostly dead and can be stabilized / healed.
- Bob is completely dead and the only thing you can do is go through his pockets for loose change...
Yes, correct, and yet you are missing the point.
Fine, this is the Paizo forum. I should have known people are only interested in the mechanics rather than the lore.
What happens in a Gnome village?
Cantrips have been fairly specifically designed to not significantly impact the game world: This is necessary to maintain the 'feel' of the classic 'sword and sorcery' setting. There have been variations on this over the years, but these tend to be very specific campaign worlds (Eberron has been mentioned a few times and is probably the place to start if you want to look into this idea further).
So, you kinda have it backwards: Rather than the cantrips defining the campaign world / lore, the game world / lore defines the cantrips.
As for the gnome village, Bob and Peter probably both pick themselves up after the fall because gnome roofs tend to be much closer to the ground...
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I don't think I particularly like the philosophy I'm seeing in this thread where people dismiss NPC as not having access to cantrips or magic at all just because they're an NPC. NPC's are made helpless enough by not being able to take classes at all--why do we feel the need to deny them their heritage feats too?
Also, I've never been able to follow the logic of "PC's are special?" if they are then how do they get that specialness in-universe? Why is the Pathfinder society even a thing if 99% of people can't even come by the talents needed to join up?
My wizard needs to learn magic from somewhere--they probably had to learn it from an NPC--and then that NPC had to learn magic from someone else. Do you see how this doesn't add up?
I don't think anyone's saying this. I certainly wasn't. The point isn't that NPCs flatly don't have magic, it's that a higher percentage of PCs have it than do NPCs, and that's pretty well established world lore.
I mentioned 5% having magic in my post above. That seems pretty accurate to the world, and sounds like a low number (which, in absolute terms, it is) but it also means that 1 in 20 people have magic. A settlement of 1000 people will have 50 spellcasters (most low level, and spread among various traditions/classes but still).
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Also, I've never been able to follow the logic of "PC's are special?" if they are then how do they get that specialness in-universe? Why is the Pathfinder society even a thing if 99% of people can't even come by the talents needed to join up?
Why are Doctors a thing if 99% of people can't even come by the resources and talents needed to join up? The fact that 99% of people can't do something is the reason the organization exists.
The number of PCs active in Golarion at any given moment is generally equal to the number of players at your table. So while NPCs can have PC options, they do not have to have them. James Jacobs have said the majority of goblin NPCs are still evil, despite most goblin PCs probably not being evil.
As far as humans go, a lot of the cantrip feat options seem like they are for people with rare backgrounds. There are bloodline ones (dragon spit, implying dragon influence) and then there are ones based upon inheritances with highly specific knowledge (the description for arcane tattoos references andcient Thassilonian magical symbols- not exactly as wide spread as a "Mom" Tattoo).
Compare that to the PF1e trait, Trifler, which gave you a few uses of prestidigitation because you happened to learn a thing or two from your grandmother. I'm not even sure if it implies your grandmother was even very GOOD at magic. That kind of casual history is closer to what the original post was talking about. But even that spell could make you far, far wealthier than the average man (1 silver/day wage for common laborer, versus the 1 gold cost of a magical cleaning).
This edition makes cantrips into better options, but it hasn't made them wide spread. Heck, I kind of feel that they made cantrips weaker. Before, the touch rules meant that the level 1 graduating class of a wizard college could zerg rush a red dragon with rays of frost. Now, you have to deal with actual, proper scaling.
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The logic of the PCs being special is simply a result of the fact that they're the main characters of the story. And since it's an interactive fiction medium, the PCs being the only ones that the GM can't control the choices of makes them pretty special indeed. The kind of special that breaks prophecies, for example, simply by showing up in a world.
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From a narrative perspective, if the main characters aren't special, or at least caught up in something special, then the audience has to ask "Why am I even paying attention?"
Being guard #37 isn't the main goal of most players when the more interesting people are off in a daring heist at the evil Earl's castle. Usually, you would prefer to follow the heist instead.
You only care about guard #37 once heist routes through his guard station.
And that is when you learn that he is actually the son of a knight that served the (long assassinated) former earl, and that he grew up on the streets while hiding his identity after the Evil Earl executed his father for knowing too much. And that is when you "conveniently" find out that he is willing to help with the heist due to his burning desire for revenge. Just in time to fill the open position after the party's fighter got killed in the heist.
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Just because cantrips are available to PCs via heritages, that does not mean NPCs are. PCs are special.
My players love to play PCs who lived as mere townsfolk until they rose to the challenge and acknowledged that their little 1st-level talents could accomplish more. In my Ironfang Invasion campaign, Zinfandel was an elf ranger training to become a prestigious Chernesardo Ranger, Sam was an escaped halfling slave (with secret rogue skills) who settled down as a goatherder, and the gnome rogue Binny was a messenger.
Zinfandel can cast Shield due to his Otherworldly Magic feat. Binny can see in the dark due to her Umbral Gnome heritage. Yet elves and gnomes always seemed more magical than humans, so an elf of a nonmagical class having a little magic fits the mileu. I am perfectly happy imagining an ordinary elvish village where most elves as a little bit of personal magic expressed as a cantrip. "I can make fire. My wife can make light. We hope our children will inherit First World magic, but we will be happy so long as they are healthy."
And Binny kept her darkvision secret. She did not want to seem special, because that might call attention to her Criminal background.
The other two PCs, the gnome druid Stormdancer and the goblin champion Tikti, stood out as weird. However, I don't want weird to mean a destined hero.
I don't think I particularly like the philosophy I'm seeing in this thread where people dismiss NPC as not having access to cantrips or magic at all just because they're an NPC. NPC's are made helpless enough by not being able to take classes at all--why do we feel the need to deny them their heritage feats too?
Also, I've never been able to follow the logic of "PC's are special?" if they are then how do they get that specialness in-universe? Why is the Pathfinder society even a thing if 99% of people can't even come by the talents needed to join up?
My wizard needs to learn magic from somewhere--they probably had to learn it from an NPC--and then that NPC had to learn magic from someone else. Do you see how this doesn't add up?
The village Phaendar in Ironfang Invasion also contained a few NPCs with class levels, such as retired Chernesardo Ranger Aubrin the Green and 6th-level cleric Noelan. Noelan's assistant Rhyna was an adept in the module, but I made her an APG playtest oracle to test out those rules and thus she could throw a few spells herself without being a PC. The villagers assumed she was an apprentice cleric, because she was embarrassed by her fire curse and avoided those spells until the town was invaded.
When Bob the Baker slips and falls off the roof of his building and is reduced to 0 hit points from falling damage, he is DEAD rather than DYING unless the GM decides he is somehow 'significant' enough to the story to use the PC dying rules. Even if Phil the Physician is standing right there, Bob's mangled body is a corpse rather than a 'dying creature' and thus not a valid target for Stabilize.
To put it another way, if Bob the Baker and Peter the PC both fall off the roof and lose all their health to falling damage, then:
• Peter is mostly dead and can be stabilized / healed.
• Bob is completely dead and the only thing you can do is go through his pockets for loose change...Unless they've actually seen it used on a PC / Significant NPC, most inhabitants of a game world wouldn't even know the Stabilize spell exists, and those who do know it exists would likely write it off as mostly useless as it won't work on anyone they are ever likely to meet...
That example can be reduced to absurdity. Suppose Bill fell off a roof, was knocked unconscious, and woke up later. "Bill, you were knocked unconscious and survived! you must be a destined hero, the mysterious player character!"
The sentence,
When most creatures reach 0 Hit Points, they die and are removed from play unless the attack was nonlethal, in which case they are instead knocked out for a significant amount
of time (usually 1 minute or more).
literally means that unconsciousness from damage is usually a death sentence. That does not match the common reality here on Earth, except for rare cases such as my brother-in-law dying when he fell out of a tree he was trimming. I don't think that the designers of PF2 wanted a world where death was the most common result of heavy injury from mishaps. "You broke a bone in your foot. It's a miracle you survived." Instead, I believe they wrote that sentence assuming that "most creatures" meant the creatures the PC just stabbed with a sword or hit with lightning, not the guy who fell off the roof at home.
Further, PCs are so rare that by that example even the clerics wouldn't know the Stabilize cantrip. The PC cleric won't prepare it because he was told in the temple, "This never works."
I houseruled away, "When most creatures reach 0 Hit Points, they die," and replaced it with, "When nonplayer creatures are dying, the GM may declare them dead instead of making recovery checks." An occassional bad guy will lie unconsious and dying for a few turns just to let me practice the recovery rules (so far, none of the PCs have dropped to dying so I have to practice on NPCs).
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It’s not handwaving, it’s the actual rule.NPCs die at 0 HP because in most cases it's not interesting (but cumbersome) to track their dying status. I would not mix up what is usually handwaived in combat for the good of the game, with how things work in the background.STABILIZE is superb. That and profiency in medicine make a perfectly capable village nurse or the lay clergy for someone like Sarenrae.You still need to get within range of your target within 18 seconds or less for this cantrip to be useful outside of combat (if you have more than 18s, then the patient probably stabilized on their own), which makes it less than superb in my opinion. In combat, it's main value is avoiding the Opportunity Attacks you might otherwise provoke without the spell's range.
EDIT: Just remembered NPCs don't use Dying rules unless the GM specifically wants them to (for villagers, 0 HP = DEAD), so this cantrip is essentially worthless when not dealing with PCs.
Creatures cannot be reduced to fewer than 0 Hit Points. When most creatures reach 0 Hit Points, they die and are removed from play unless the attack was nonlethal, in which case they are instead knocked out for a significant amount of time (usually 1 minute or more). When undead and construct creatures reach 0 Hit Points, they are destroyed. Player characters, their companions, and other significant characters and creatures don't automatically die when they reach 0 Hit Points. Instead, they are knocked out and are at risk of death. At the GM's discretion, villains, powerful monsters, special NPCs, and enemies with special abilities that are likely to bring them back to the fight (like ferocity, regeneration, or healing magic) can use these rules as well.It’s the GM’s choice if they want to use the Dying rules for NPCs, but the standard rule is that they don’t.
Yes, that's the rule.
But the OP is asking about how cantrips availability impacts the game world, so they are clearly trying to make that world more consistent. Strictly reading of rules that are meant for combat, and in particular combat that involves the PCs, doesn't lead to a consistent world because then you have the Stabilize cantrip not existing (why would one even invent that spell, if it never worked on anyone before the PCs started to adventure?), Doomed effects not affecting anyone ever (again, until the PCs show up), people unable to hit a door with an axe, and Fireballs not burning paper.It's clear to me the rule saying "When most creatures reach 0 Hit Points, they die and are removed from play" is a tool to make combat more straightforward and fun, not an absolute rule of the game world. But everyone plays how they like, after all, so the OP's gnome village will have someone with Stabilize who is useful to the community, and yours probably won't.
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This is a pet peeve of mine.
Games where people can cause fire or acid damage every round all day long just don't work.
No prison can hold you. No thieves guild can ever be pinned down by dead bodies, because they're all dissolved.
Just to mention two cases.
I sympathize with wizards having to fight with daggers and crossbows, but unlimited energy damage is not the solution.
Fortunately, you already have to suspend so much disbelief regarding the effect casters would have on economy, politics, society and culture, that ignoring the all-day elemental damage in prisons problem is easy.
Stop treating the game as a simulator of medieval life and your gaming will only be better for it.
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This is a pet peeve of mine.
Games where people can cause fire or acid damage every round all day long just don't work.
No prison can hold you. No thieves guild can ever be pinned down by dead bodies, because they're all dissolved.
Just to mention two cases.
I sympathize with wizards having to fight with daggers and crossbows, but unlimited energy damage is not the solution.
Fortunately, you already have to suspend so much disbelief regarding the effect casters would have on economy, politics, society and culture, that ignoring the all-day elemental damage in prisons problem is easy.
Stop treating the game as a simulator of medieval life and your gaming will only be better for it.
Well Gorbacz, this is exactly a thread about how cantrips availability would make the game world look like.
You may not care about that (and I mostly don't, either), but the OP does, so discussing about that is just the point.|
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Yes, that's the rule.
But the OP is asking about how cantrips availability impacts the game world, so they are clearly trying to make that world more consistent. Strictly reading of rules that are meant for combat, and in particular combat that involves the PCs, doesn't lead to a consistent world because then you have the Stabilize cantrip not existing (why would one even invent that spell, if it never worked on anyone before the PCs started to adventure?), Doomed effects not affecting anyone ever (again, until the PCs show up), people unable to hit a door with an axe, and Fireballs not burning paper.
It's clear to me the rule saying "When most creatures reach 0 Hit Points, they die and are removed from play" is a tool to make combat more straightforward and fun, not an absolute rule of the game world. But everyone plays how they like, after all, so the OP's gnome village will have someone with Stabilize who is useful to the community, and yours probably won't.
It literally is an absolute rule of the game world. There’s nothing bad about changing it using Dying rules for NPCs, but you are in fact changing it. Not even changing it, just using the alternate of the rule literally below it where it encourages the GM to do so to suit their story.
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This is a pet peeve of mine.
Games where people can cause fire or acid damage every round all day long just don't work.
No prison can hold you. No thieves guild can ever be pinned down by dead bodies, because they're all dissolved.
Just to mention two cases.
I sympathize with wizards having to fight with daggers and crossbows, but unlimited energy damage is not the solution.
Fortunately, you already have to suspend so much disbelief regarding the effect casters would have on economy, politics, society and culture, that ignoring the all-day elemental damage in prisons problem is easy.
Stop treating the game as a simulator of medieval life and your gaming will only be better for it.
Well Gorbacz, this is exactly a thread about how cantrips availability would make the game world look like.
You may not care about that (and I mostly don't, either), but the OP does, so discussing about that is just the point.
Telling people they shouldn't mind X is as valid as telling them how should they mind X. I'm not saying that their concerns are irrelavant, but I'm saying that their concerns are irrelavant.
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I think what D&D players (and by extension Pathfinder players) get confused about is that they think the PCs are making the decisions that the PLAYERS make.
Like, "sorcerer" doesn't choose to learn fireball, they just innately develop that power when they grow in strength :p
And NPCs in general don't gain experience points :P
Eberron (and some Forgotten Realms campaign setting books) make different assumption, that the pc class options are as common for everyone in the world as they are for PCs. And yeah that makes setting different, but I seriously would hate it if every setting was like Eberron since Eberron's whole appeal was in standing out =P
Another way to say it is: NPCs are GM's PCs, and GM didn't choose majority of them to have access to cantrips, hence why they don't affect the world as much. When you yourself GM, you can change this as much as you like.
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But Zapp the premise of this thread is flawed . There simply isn’t the spread of cantrip users that the OP assumed
And some are of the opinion that the proportion of people with those powers is not enough to fundamentally change the world unless you really want to overthink things
A potential example is that there are actually a bunch of relatively high level clerics in Korvosa and they are unable to stop the spread of a plague despite having magic that can remove it
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The world of pf2 Golarion is designed on two levels. One is a set of rules to play a game. The other is an imagined fantasy setting that does not take the rules into consideration for how the setting functions.
For some people this is fine, the rules don't have to define the world. The rules just exist so we can play a game. For others, the game rules are like the laws of physics. They define the way the world works. For the second camp of thinkers, that's fine for our home games, but it isn't how Golarion was written. If you want to run your own version of Golarion that works this way, totally fine, but realize you'll have to rewrite a lot of stuff to make it make sense by the rules.
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Ideally, the theme of this question is less whether e.g. Chill Touch does negative or cold damage, rather it is how trivial magic interacts with the environment and setting.
I don't think cantrips would be trivial...I think minor magics would be vital to survival for everyone.
Imagine living a world with all the monsters of bestiaries! (Then add all the gods.)
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This is a pet peeve of mine.
Games where people can cause fire or acid damage every round all day long just don't work.
No prison can hold you. No thieves guild can ever be pinned down by dead bodies, because they're all dissolved.
Just to mention two cases.
I sympathize with wizards having to fight with daggers and crossbows, but unlimited energy damage is not the solution.
I mean, they already had unlimited energy damage in PF1. It was 1d3, but it's still unlimited. It wasn't a big deal because of Hardness...and in fact still isn't for basically the same reason.
That said, this is also not a problem with level 1 cantrips on a mechanical level In terms of spellcasting level 1 cantrips do 1d4+4 to 1d6+4 at most. Stone walls have Hardness 14 and 56 HP (cell doors have even more).
You need 2nd level Telekinetic Projectile, or 3rd level of other cantrips, to have even a tiny chance of doing 1-2 HP to that wall, and every casting is loud and obvious, so if there's an actual guard anywhere on the same floor as you (and there should be), that'll get stopped real quick. Heck, even wooden walls are Hardness 10 and will thus be immune to 1st level cantrips.
That's assuming you even can cast, of course, since many casters will have issues doing this once they've been locked in a cell for a day, and you can keep them tied up and gagged until that time passes. Wizards need to prepare their cantrips, remember, and Clerics and many Bards don't have any cantrips that will do this...that leaves some Sorcerers, Bards with Telekinetic Projectile, and Druids as the people this is a concern with.
So, this is an issue with some spellcasters starting at level 3 to 5, and can usually be solved by having them watched. That sounds like a slight logistical hurdle, not a major problem. And people who you need to do this with are probably 1 in 100 or less...and how many of those people commit crimes that require you to lock them up? I mean, if 10% of casters who could do this commit major crimes (and that's an absurdly high number), that's still 1 in 1000 people, assuming half survive being captured, that's less than 10 people in need of this kind of imprisonment in all of Korvosa, a fair sized city.
A small town without a stone cell will have bigger issues...but if they capture a 3rd level or higher spellcaster, I'd imagine they'd call their larger neighbors for help anyway, since they lack the people to guard them properly long term.
Long term prisoners you may need other solutions for, but it depends on the prisoner and circumstances, and they're hardly impossible. Skilled guards are always an option, of course, a ritual antimagic field on a place seems plausible, and for crueler regimes you can always cut out the caster's tongue.
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In Ironfang Invasion, there's a hobgoblin manual on catching elf magic users that states there is a small bone in the thumb and pinky which prevent people from casting when broken. Not sure if that's still true with the changes to somatic components, but it could be.
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In Ironfang Invasion, there's a hobgoblin manual on catching elf magic users that states there is a small bone in the thumb and pinky which prevent people from casting when broken. Not sure if that's still true with the changes to somatic components, but it could be.That's super interesting actually. I figured it would be the pointer finger and thumb--but do casters point with their thumb and pinky finer when casting? That's a really interesting mental image.
Totally man, that's cause it's hang loose elfy magic.
Also, I've never been able to follow the logic of "PC's are special?"
Pathfinder is written with that assumption and it plays into all the rules of the game. It is a system intended to support larger than life heroics. You are intended to battle giants and dragons which somehow don't just squash you like an insect.
There are other rpg systems that don't take this assumption. Those types of games tend to be point based systems instead of level based as the whole levels mechanic is all about supporting how your characters are special and so much better than the normal folk.
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I'd argue that even in an RPG that takes great pains to make sure that the PCs are "just normal folks" that the PCs are still special. That's got nothing to do with mechanics, and everything to do with the fact that those characters are played by players, not the GM.
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I houseruled away, "When most creatures reach 0 Hit Points, they die," and replaced it with, "When nonplayer creatures are dying, the GM may declare them dead instead of making recovery checks." An occassional bad guy will lie unconsious and dying for a few turns just to let me practice the recovery rules (so far, none of the PCs have dropped to dying so I have to practice on NPCs).
I have it that Humanoids (or sentient creatures) and those that the players at some point attacked Non-lethally go to dying, so they can save them if they wish, whereas monsters automatically die.
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Oddly, I'm kinda opposed to this house rule on a matter of morality:I houseruled away, "When most creatures reach 0 Hit Points, they die," and replaced it with, "When nonplayer creatures are dying, the GM may declare them dead instead of making recovery checks." An occassional bad guy will lie unconsious and dying for a few turns just to let me practice the recovery rules (so far, none of the PCs have dropped to dying so I have to practice on NPCs).I have it that Humanoids (or sentient creatures) and those that the players at some point attacked Non-lethally go to dying, so they can save them if they wish, whereas monsters automatically die.
- Good characters should generally not let incapacitated opponents bleed out.
- This means you'll probably end up taking a bunch of prisoners after each fight.
- Handling masses of prisoners is the sort of thing games like this aren't really set up for.
- As such, the '0hp = dead' rule actually removes a troublesome morality issue that might otherwise bog down a campaign.