Bouncing Back from Zero

[siegfriedliner]

So it's something I experienced playtesting the three actions to manifest your eidolon are pretty much negligible before combat and they are affordable if not cheap at the start of combat before people have moved into postion.

But they become imensly expensive right after being knocked down. I found it to expensive in a tense fight to actually use.
A turn of inaction is really big millstone in this game especially when everyone is already in postion.

[Sedoriku]

Hrmm, do you have any ideas on how that could be done better? A mid level feat to allow one to quickly summon their eidolon once per day, or maybe make it a focus spell? Or is it just a penalty for playing stupid and not keeping either the eidolon or summoner near a healer?

[siegfriedliner]

Well in this scenario it was a penalty by being crit in a boss encounter.

[Falgaia]

Personally, I don't see why it can't work like a regular Summon spell and just give the Eidolon two actions on the turn where it manifests onto the field. Its still an action sink for the Summoner at that point, but it at least gets the Eidolon back into the fight in the same way a standard summon spell would.

I suspect the primary reason the effect doesn't give the Eidolon2 actions is because the current iteration allows the Summoner to recall the Eidolon to adjacency as an option, but I think as long as it was worded in such a way as to only give the actions on re-manifest, it shouldn't be a problem.

Example, bold is suggested addition wrote:

Your eidolon appears in an adjacent open space, and can take 2 actions on the turn it is summoned. If your eidolon was already manifested, choose instead whether to unmanifest them or teleport them to an adjacent open space; this does not grant additional actions to the Eidolon.

[HumbleGamer]

Let's consider other classes

Sword and board combatant ( or two weapons combatant )

Quote:

1- Grip the weapon

2- Grip the shield
3- Stand up
4- Eventually, repositioning

Two handed combatant

Quote:

1- Grip the weapon

2- Stand up
3- Eventually, repositioning

Spellcaster

Quote:

1- Grip the weapon ( probably a staff or a bow )

2- Stand up

A downed summoner could just manifest its eidolon even while prone on the ground, then manage to get up maybe 1 round after. Given the fact the Eidolon could be summoned anywhere, it wouldn't need to step in order to get close to the enemy he wants to hit.

Indeed it would really benefit from something like "kip up" as any other class ( action economy and no reaction trigger ).

[Falgaia]

HumbleGamer wrote:

Let's consider other classes

Sword and board combatant ( or two weapons combatant )

Quote:

1- Grip the weapon

2- Grip the shield
3- Stand up
4- Eventually, repositioning

Two handed combatant

Quote:

1- Grip the weapon

2- Stand up
3- Eventually, repositioning

Spellcaster

Quote:

1- Grip the weapon ( probably a staff or a bow )

2- Stand up

A downed summoner could just manifest its eidolon even while prone on the ground, then manage to get up maybe 1 round after. Given the fact the Eidolon could be summoned anywhere, it wouldn't need to step in order to get close to the enemy he wants to hit.

Indeed it would really benefit from something like "kip up" as any other class ( action economy and no reaction trigger ).

Manifest is worded differently from other Summon spells in that it A) Doesn't grant any actions to the summoned creature (All summon spells in this edition give the summoned creature 2 actions on the drop; summoning sickness was removed between editions) and B)The range you can choose to summon is Adjacent. Worst case scenario, I think Manifest should give at least 1 action to just move the Eidolon away from the Summoner so they don't have to roll twice in the case of a fireball, but I don't see 2 actions on the Manifest turn being overly powerful when it comes at the cost of the Summoner remaining prone and vulnerable on the ground in the backrow.

[Kuroko-chan]

Manifesting the Eidolon is probably too much of an punishment after you've gone down since you're spending your entire turn just to spawn it (it doesn't get any actions, unlike Summon X spells) so you have to spend your entire turn just getting it back to stand around. You can't stand up if you Manifested so you're still prone and in a really bad place. Even if you spend your turn to stand up and run away you're still staring down the barrel of a 'dead' turn.

I think rather than having a feat or similar focus spell be the answer dropping it to 2 actions and adjusting what you can do with Manifest Eidolon might a little smoother for gameplay. That way you can at least crawl away or stand up to get rid of Prone before summoning, or summon it while down and still have an action for it to strike an enemy or protect you (such as Summoner Shield Evolution).

[HumbleGamer]

I was aware of the differences cost, but I really misread the manifest stuff ( I was sure you could summon it whenever in a 100 feet radius ).

Maybe instead of costing 2 actions it could have something extra added to its description ( I like the 3 action manifest, because it forbids you from using anything else but the manifest ), like a stride, as you proposed.

Something like "after you manifest your eidolon, either you or your eidolon can stride".

[Sedoriku]

Or add something about standing up from prone? Personally having it be less than three actions would possibly over power the class (especially if there's some of the benefits to summoning your eidolon that have been suggested around here added as well. )

[KrispyXIV]

What if there were a focus spell version of Manifesting that had a more advantageous action cost and a bonus upon summoning your Eidolon - sortof like Ostentatious Arrival except that it had some sort of ability to position your Eidolon not adjacent to you.

Bonus points if it also comes with healing or temporary hp.

[Martialmasters]

KrispyXIV wrote:

What if there were a focus spell version of Manifesting that had a more advantageous action cost and a bonus upon summoning your Eidolon - sortof like Ostentatious Arrival except that it had some sort of ability to position your Eidolon not adjacent to you.

Bonus points if it also comes with healing or temporary hp.

Does the eidolon have to be summoned next to you I thought it didn't?

If so a feat or focus power would be good, especially if you work in marks possible change if you could rule the summon as part of the act together and it attacks the enemy you summoned it next to.

[Mass Kneebreaker]

Hmm...how about That if you go unconscious, your Eidolon doesn't vanish, but is also knocked unconscious? You do share the same life force after all?

[KrispyXIV]

Martialmasters wrote:

Does the eidolon have to be summoned next to you I thought it didn't?

If so a feat or focus power would be good, especially if you work in marks possible change if you could rule the summon as part of the act together and it attacks the enemy you summoned it next to.

Adjacent open space :(

Summoning it further away from yourself is essentially a free stride/movement action that ignores all intervening obstacles, so I understand why it works that way by default - but a feat or focus spell that creates a limited exception would be a pretty strong choice imo as its both flexibility and Virtual Action Economy.

[KrispyXIV]

Mass Kneebreaker wrote:

Hmm...how about That if you go unconscious, your Eidolon doesn't vanish, but is also knocked unconscious? You do share the same life force after all?

Most of the ways to manage and mitigatr the linked HP pools go away when you fall unconcious and the mechanic becomes significantly more of a drawback. Way easier to get incidentally killed by taking additional damage and increasing your dieing condition.

I'm fine with linked hp when its a game mechanic I can play with and around - while I'm incapacitated, not so much.

[Temperans]

This is why seperate hp is better.

You can have a feat that lets the Eidolon stay even while the summoner might be unconcious. Or you can have the summoner sacrifice HP to keep the eidolon up. It is not forced on you all the time.

[Draco18s]

The upside to shared HP pool is that the eidolon can sacrifice hp to keep the summoner up (effectively).

You can't do this in PF1, which came up for me last week when the party got (more or less) ambushed by some enemies that opened up with Cone of Cold at a higher initiative than I did.

Eidolon made the save (+Evasion)
Summoner failed the save (and immediately died by going too far negative)

[David knott 242]

Note that they have already sped up the process of manifesting the eidolon from PF1, where it usually took a full minute to do.\

[siegfriedliner]

David knott 242 wrote:

Note that they have already sped up the process of manifesting the eidolon from PF1, where it usually took a full minute to do.\

But you had a large pool of your highest level summoning spells in p1 which you could cast with half the action budget and with a duration 10 times as long as anyone else. Summoning was also at least twice as powerful as 2e. You also had 2-3 times as many spell slots (where most spells were more powerful than 2e). So basically you were in an incomparably different position than 2e when your eidolon goes down.

[Castilliano]

I don't see this as a problem.
As HumbleGamer noted, going down poses a comparable problem for many builds.
Arguably, it should be. Your PC got smacked unconscious, so expecting or asking that to have zero consequence w/ any amount of healing seems a bit much. Summoners also get the benefit of often (hopefully) being out of range of the source that dropped them/their Eidelon. Imagine being the two-weapon warrior that fell beside a Hydra.

[David knott 242]

siegfriedliner wrote:

David knott 242 wrote:

Note that they have already sped up the process of manifesting the eidolon from PF1, where it usually took a full minute to do.\

But you had a large pool of your highest level summoning spells in p1 which you could cast with half the action budget and with a duration 10 times as long as anyone else. Summoning was also at least twice as powerful as 2e. You also had 2-3 times as many spell slots (where most spells were more powerful than 2e). So basically you were in an incomparably different position than 2e when your eidolon goes down.

That is probably why they sped up the process as much as they did.

[Vallarthis]

You have to be careful how much freedom you give for where you manifest your eidolon because of transpose. If you can manifest it anywhere within 100ft, with transpose that becomes a 100ft teleport at will.